I remember a million years ago, a friend of ours played trumpet. He kept playing this Louis track (cannot recall it now) every time it got to a certain part he said did you hear that it was amazing. Each time it eluded us, we were just not ready for the man.
@JeffG/JeffJ: I was in Buenos Aires last week and found some unknown to me reissues of Argentinian free jazz LPs from the late-60's/early-70s. It all seemed very nice expect that they were too expensive for my "taste" in that moment.
@JeffG/JeffJ: by "free jazz" I must say kinda fusion adventuresome jazz, one of them was Quinteplus and the other was a kinda of spoken word play together with some free music, or so the description said. Anyway, next time I'll be there I'll try to bring some of it.
Back in the late '70s, I remember hearing on the car radio a track that sounded for all the world like Louis Armstrong singing "The Creator Has a Master Plan" and nearly drove into a ditch. I waited forever to hear the DJ back announce the set but he never did and, after a while, I started to think I imagined it. From that point on for several years, I used to ask about it every time I walked in a record store that looked like it had a decent jazz section.
I remember walking into J&R Music World one day in early 1983. I had just moved to NYC and I figured the whip-smart New York jazz clerks would know something about this record. I went up to a guy behind the counter and asked about the Louis song I'd heard on the radio. I will NEVER forget the look of paint-peeling contempt he shot back at me. It was as if I had asked him if Louis Armstrong had sex with ferrets. (And ferrets were still illegal in NYC at that time.)
Flash forward a few years and I'm thumbing through record bins in a vinyl shoppe in New Haven, CT, and I find a copy of a French RCA release of Armstrong's final recording session—containing the coveted song. I let out an involuntary WHOOOP that startled everyone in the place.
From that moment on, every damn time I went back to J&R I looked for that same asswipe employee, but never saw him again.
Right around that same time, I actually applied for a job working in the stockroom at J&R. I did not get the job. All prospective employees were forced to take a lie-detecter test, and apparently they didn't like my answers. True story.
Actually, one of the questions the Lie Detector Guy asked me was "are you gay." I've always wondered if my answer in the negative came up a "lie" on the test!
I have always imagined there to be a direct connection between Archie Shepp's tune "Rufus (Swung His Face at Last to the Wind, Then His Neck Snapped)" and the character Rufus in James Baldwin's "Another Country" who jumps to his death off the George Washington Bridge.
@Jeff J: It's an 18-minute track, I understand that. And besides, I'm pleased to hear Baldwin-related tracks that I didn't heard before or didn't know that were related to him.
Doug, you get those types of asswipes in the comic-shop and boardgaming/roleplaying-game worlds, too, often enough for me to no longer visit shops for those sort of things. And they're usually even worse that way with women customers, which is a whole other anti–Comic Book Guy rant. Fuck that noise; Amazon, baby. (Or CD Baby, baby.)
And holy shit with that "are you gay?" question on the text. Were they screening candidate for the fuckin' CIA?!
To think this great artist was essentially living on the streets (Washington Square Park, in San Francisco) for the better part of a decade. Go fuck a ferret, America!
<-- Previous playlist | Back to destination: OUT with Jeff Golick playlists | Next playlist -->
RSS feeds for destination: OUT with Jeff Golick: Playlists feed | MP3 archives feed
| E-mail Jeff Golick | Other WFMU Playlists | All artists played by destination: OUT with Jeff Golick |Listen on the Internet | Contact Us | Music & Programs | WFMU Home Page | Support Us | FAQ
Live Audio Streams for Give the Drummer Radio: Pop-up | 128k MP3 (More streams: [+])
Listener comments!
listener james from westwood:
fred:
duke:
Doug Schulkind:
Dean:
Dean:
Doug Schulkind:
doca:
doca:
Jeff Golick:
Happy bday to Dean's wife!
And also Louis Armstrong.
And, I believe, Sonny Simmons.
First set to Louis, @doca. Then we branch OUT.
Dean:
Jeff J:
@doca - some branching OUT within the Louis set, too!
Jeff J:
Doug Schulkind:
Nope, Jeff J, wish I had that Louis book.
Jeff Golick:
Jeff Golick:
Brian in UK:
I remember a million years ago, a friend of ours played trumpet. He kept playing this Louis track (cannot recall it now) every time it got to a certain part he said did you hear that it was amazing. Each time it eluded us, we were just not ready for the man.
Brian in UK:
Gary at the Laundromat:
Jeff Golick:
duke:
doca:
Jeff Golick:
doca:
Dean:
Jeff Golick:
Gary at the Laundromat:
Doug Schulkind:
I remember walking into J&R Music World one day in early 1983. I had just moved to NYC and I figured the whip-smart New York jazz clerks would know something about this record. I went up to a guy behind the counter and asked about the Louis song I'd heard on the radio. I will NEVER forget the look of paint-peeling contempt he shot back at me. It was as if I had asked him if Louis Armstrong had sex with ferrets. (And ferrets were still illegal in NYC at that time.)
Flash forward a few years and I'm thumbing through record bins in a vinyl shoppe in New Haven, CT, and I find a copy of a French RCA release of Armstrong's final recording session—containing the coveted song. I let out an involuntary WHOOOP that startled everyone in the place.
From that moment on, every damn time I went back to J&R I looked for that same asswipe employee, but never saw him again.
Doug Schulkind:
Brian in UK:
duke:
Doug: Yes
Lie Detector Guy: Liar. Get the hell out of here.
Doug Schulkind:
doca:
Jeff J:
Jeff Golick:
Doug Schulkind:
doca:
Jeff Golick:
Dean:
Jeff Golick:
Doug Schulkind:
Clarence Thomas can go fuck a ferret.
Dean:
listener james from westwood:
And holy shit with that "are you gay?" question on the text. Were they screening candidate for the fuckin' CIA?!
duke:
Doug Schulkind:
I love that thought. Allows me to think back on that crazy episode in a whole different and more humane way. Thank you.
Jeff Golick:
Doug Schulkind:
duke:
Dervish:
Jeff Golick:
Jeff Golick:
listener james from westwood:
Doug Schulkind:
fred:
Doug Schulkind:
duke:
Jeff Golick:
fred:
listener james from westwood:
Jeff Golick: