Friday, August 12th
wake up!
Marc Ribot’s Ceramic Dog (MR, guitar, vocals; Ches Smith, drums; Shahzad Ismaily, bass), live (studio performance), Seattle, 6/22/16
music clip of the day
jazz/blues/rock/classical/gospel/more
Category: guitar
2016
Saturday, August 6th
Sometimes the best of what’s new is old.
Betty Davis, “Down Home Girl” (Miles Davis & Teo Macero, prods.; John McLaughlin [guitar], Herbie Hancock [keyboards], Harvey Brooks [bass], Mitch Mitchell [drums]), 6/28/16 (rec. 1969)
**********
lagniappe
art beat: yesterday, Art Institute of Chicago
From Thirteen Laughing at Each Other, Juan Muñoz (1953-2001), through 10/5/16
2016
Friday, July 22nd
summer in the city
Savages, “Fuckers,” live, Chicago (Pitchfork Music Festival), 7/16/16
2016
Monday, July 18th
only rock ‘n’ roll
Savages, live, England (Bristol), 2016*
*****
*Set list (courtesy of YouTube):
1. I Need Something New
2. The Answer
3. Sad Person
4. Evil
5. Surrender
6. Hit Me
7. Husbands
8. T.I.W.Y.G.
9. Adore
2016
Monday, July 4th
Happy Fourth!
Let’s celebrate by remembering three giants.
Ralph Stanley, singer, banjo player, February 25, 1927-June 23, 2016
“Little Maggie,” live (TV show), Austin, Tx., 1980
*****
Bernie Worrell, keyboard player, April 19, 1944-June 24, 2016
Live (with George Clinton & Parliament Funkadelic), Switzerland (Montreux Jazz Festival), 2004
*****
Scotty Moore, guitar player, December 27, 1931-June 28, 2016
“Blue Suede Shoes” (with Elvis Presley), live, 1956
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lagniappe
radio
Today, Louis Armstrong’s adopted birthday, it’s all Louis all day at WKCR (Columbia University).
2016
Thursday, June 30th
No matter how I’m feeling—up, down, whatever—he makes me feel better.
Tony Allen (1940-), drummer
Live, Paris, 2015
#1
#2
*****
Live (with Oghene Kologbo & World Squad), Brussels, 2014
*****
Interview, 2015
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lagniappe
random sights
this morning, Oak Park, Ill. (Roscoe, my granddog)
2016
Saturday, June 11th
There’s Amsterdam.
There’s Ethiopia.
And there’s Amsterdam in Ethiopia.
The Ex & Han Bennink (drums), Ethiopia, 2002
2016
Friday, June 10th
voices I miss
Albert Collins (1932-1993), live, Switzerland (Montreux), 1979
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lagniappe
art beat: other day, Art Institute of Chicago
Aaron Siskind (1903-1991), Chicago 28 1957 (Abstractions, through 8/14/16)
*****
tonight in Chicago
The Chicago Blues Festival celebrates the 45th anniversary of Alligator Records, where, in the ’70s, barely out of college, I had the good fortune to co-produce recordings by Albert Collins, Koko Taylor, Son Seals, Fenton Robinson, Jimmy Johnson, Carey Bell, et al.
2016
Tuesday, June 7th
like nobody else
Leroy Jenkins Gut Band (LJ [1932-2007] violin, compositions; Brandon Ross, guitar; David Wong, bass; Newman Taylor Baker, drums), live, New York, 2000
2016
Monday, May 30th
Vancouver folkie + iconic Memphis rhythm section.
This should never have worked.
But it does, wonderfully.
Frazey Ford, “September Fields” (Indian Ocean), 2014
**********
lagniappe
reading table
The climate is pretty.
I wrote everything on it.
That’s the activity where it
gets relatively inauspicious.***
And you were sitting there
in the night of life. It sure was good.
My favorite desserts were there.
And when they invite you, it’s like an important document
goes missing. I’ll give you an example:
a twelve-year struggle upstate, in
the slick atmosphere of the breakfast room.
It might have gotten stuck in her farthingale.Otherwise no reply.
—John Ashbery (1927-), “As Someone Who Likes Travel,” fragments (New Yorker, 5/30/16)
To read Ashbery is to read English as a foreign language—which I mean as a compliment.
music clip of the day 