Search & Destroy: John Coltrane

that said, the vastly underrated "stellar regions" is probably my favorite in the realm of ~coltrane records~ vs. whatever pantheonical land meditations inhabits

was checking out a new collected Coltrane interviews thing in the bookstore this week. amazing how chill the guy was, considering some of the music he made. seems almost ridiculously down to earth.

I like "First Meditations" a lot

Recent favorites are Ole:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0hN5JpIG0B0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zsIOgLp5rlU

and Alabama (this is live version but you get the point):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8j_TDoOPnIA

Does anyone have the Prestige Box Sets - Fearless Leader, Interplay or Side Steps? Worth picking up?

i have 'em. some great stuff, also some very so-so, under-rehearsed blowing session-type stuff. I'd say Fearless Leader is the best of the lot.

Yeah, I have all three, too. I agree that Fearless Leader is the best one, but each has plenty to recommend it. I find myself listening to '50s Coltrane more often than '60s Coltrane these days; sometimes you just want to hear a dude with incredible talent playing melodic, easily-understood and -enjoyed music rather than listening to that same incredibly talented dude Brillo-ing his soul in front of you.

yeah, true. one essential thing that's included on Interplay is the Kenny Burrell collab album. Great from start to finish.

Love the Coltrane/Burrell record. Otherwise I agree his Prestige work was inconsistent but has some great moments. A couple of tracks that come to mind are Good Bait and Goldsboro Express.

Wow. How did I never hear Olé before? It's brilliant.

All the Atlantic stuff is top notch. Used to own the Complete Prestige set but sold it because it was never getting played. It wasn't bad, just nothing compared to the Atlantic and Impulse stuff.

Wow. How did I never hear Olé before? It's brilliant.

I know, right?

meditations is basically the best record ever made by humans on earth

Yes.
yes, it is.

Kind of ashamed I never got around to some of the later material until recently. Sun Ship and Interstellar Space are so incredible.

eh, no reason to be ashamed. i'm holding off on the later stuff, just because i'm scared of not having any more coltrane albums to discover!

Giant Steps still rules and is a permanent feature on my mp3 player. Need to get my hands on Olé and the Kenny Burrell collab. What's so great about the latter?

latter is great just to hear coltrane in a different context -- pretty much the only time he really played with a guitarist, i think? some of it is straightforward late 50s hard bop, but really good straightforward late 50s hard bop. highlight is the coltrane/burrell duet on "why was i born" which is insanely pretty.

I listened to Bags & Trane for the first time tonight.... what an unrelenting set of performances. It's like they are trying to top each other with every new solo.

have never really given the ascension and later period a chance but it's on the list.

I remember always hearing about how Tyner and Jones didn't like the direction Coltrane was going in toward the end, and there's all this tension in the late quartet recordings that I think actually makes for amazing music. I wonder if there's something to that -- Money Jungle has a similar sense of tension and struggle. I also remember hearing about how Keith Jarrett hated playing the Rhodes in the beginning, and he sounds so great on it on Miles records.

latter is great just to hear coltrane in a different context -- pretty much the only time he really played with a guitarist, i think?
― tylerw

excellent will have to check. totally into my jazz guitarists at the mo, particularly sonny sharrock on the herbie mann album and john mclaughlin on the jack johnson sessions.

(not that i'm comparing kenny b. to the guitarists above of course)

ha, yeah, was gonna say -- don't expect that kind of stuff from the burrell/coltrane record!

Someone kinda touched on this upthread, but I"m curious...listening to Live At Birdland this afternoon and during Alabama, I swear I'm hearing a human voice muttering faintly in the background. Right around the 2 minute mark and goes on for like 30 seconds.

Is that Elvin Jones or McCoy Tyner giving instructions or something? Any jazzheads able to offer some insight?

...and now I'm hearing that same "sound" all over Your Lady. What am I hearing?!

crowd noise? or, elvin does grunt and vocalize a lot to himself when he's playing. i don't remember it coming through on that record, but haven't listened to it in a long time.

It sounds too consistent to be crowd noise. Also, these are the two studio tracks on the album. So I'm gonna pretend like it's Elvin for now. At least until I can put some headphones on and really listen.

These two songs, btw...is there anything better?!

I bizarrely worded Googs search sent me to this:
Jazz pianists who make weird humming noises during their improvisations

haha...

you can hear him doing it pretty clearly during the drum solo near the end of this (killer) duet w/richard davis, like around 7:10: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4uMk0aKMpqQ

That's definitely similar to what I"m hearing on Alabama and Your Lady. Cool.

I always assumed that was Jimmy Garrison; you can hear him singing along with some of his solos.

Been meaning to check out the Elvin/Richard Davis collabo forever, thanks.

(Also will rep for this Richard Davis album
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_IyDZgXq8QH0/SzZFIOoRtfI/AAAAAAAADoc/vpwNkSUGRVc/s400/Richard+Davis+-+Now
although I don't think Jordan likes the drummer too much)

Need to read the other thread again, but the thing about the humming is, always wonder how loud does the source have to be and where does the microphone have to be placed and what pattern does it have to have for it to be so audible to the listener? Although maybe I already said that on other thread three years ago.

although I don't think Jordan likes the drummer too much)

really, did i say something against freddie waits at some point? honestly not too familiar with his playing, i only know it from this crazy live freddie hubbard record. nasheet is great though.

So... Ascension Edition I or II..?

Let's Save John Coltrane's House
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/03/opinion/sunday/03sun4.html?_r=2

Would Ravi Coltrane be worth seeing? He's coming to Toronto soon. I don't know any of his music, but the thought of seeing Coltrane's son is inherently powerful to me. (In a way that Julian Lennon and Jakob Dylan never were.) I didn't even know he had a son who was out there playing music.

I saw him a few years back and he was pretty good. He closed the show with a Giant Steps that he dedicated to his mother who had just died recently. And it was definitely powerful in a way.

Definitely go. Who is he playing with?

Christine Jensen Quartet. It's very tempting--I didn't realize it was coming up so fast, though.

http://performance.rcmusic.ca/event/ravi-coltrane-quintet-and-christine-jensen-quartet-featuring-ingrid-jensen

Definitely go. Ingrid Jensen is great too. I've seen her with Darcy James Argue's Secret Society. Haven't seen or heard her sister though.

Today's his birthday; 24-hour birthday broadcast today on WKCR.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/-/370773643959

if i had $115,000 ... i'd probably do something else with it. but pretty cool!

i wouldn't pay more than 85k for an alto wtf

Sun Ship: The Complete Session

!!!!!

great record...some of these alts showed up a little while back, but i'm sure this release will sound better: http://bigozine2.com/roio/?p=1205

the Big O boot definitely makes me want to hear the complete sessions.

I could listen to 20 takes of the title track.

Yeah, I dl'd those outtakes, love it.

Weirdly, this is being touted as the only complete session by the Quartet in existence. Did Impulse throw a bunch of stuff away that they shouldn't have?