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From: mfs@mhuxr.UUCP (Damballah Wedo)
Newsgroups: net.music
Subject: Re: progressive rock mavens (really NY clubs and Thurman Barker)
Message-ID: <477@mhuxr.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 14-Nov-85 08:40:31 EST
Article-I.D.: mhuxr.477
Posted: Thu Nov 14 08:40:31 1985
Date-Received: Sat, 16-Nov-85 10:49:02 EST
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> Josh Marantz:
> Last weekend, I went down to NY and saw the Modern Jazz Quartet at the
> Blue Note, and I thought they were excellent, but it was hardly worth
> the ~$25 for one hour.

The Blue Note does tend to be a rip-off. Unfortunately, they are the only
club that books BIG jazz acts like the MJQ (or Sarah Vaughan or Wayne Shorter)
so if one wants to see people like that (and it IS much better in a club than
in a concert hall) especially since they don't tour that often, one is
stuck with the Blue Note. Not the best of situations.

Also, try some other NYC clubs: the Vanguard, Sweet Basil, Fat Tuesdays,
Mims, Bradley's, The Cookery, Mikell's, The West End (upper west side).
They all book good acts, and are significantly cheaper than the Blue Note.

> Last night I saw Thurman Barker trio (or something like that) at
> Charlie's Tap in Cambridge.  I mainly wanted to check out the club,
> and I'd never heard of the trio (actually there were four of them, but
> I'll not dwell on that).  Anyway, I wasn't wild about them.  The
> drummer had a real crisp sound, and the bassist was very good, but
> they didn't work together well.  They reminded me at times of the more
> disjoint parts of Miles Davis' Bitches Brew, but it just didn't work
> nearly as well.  The four of them would meander around the sonic
> spectrum, each in his own key, each in his own rhythm, and there was
> nothing [for me] to grab onto.  I'm sure everything they were doing
> was in reality more cohesive than I describe, but I just couldn't
> appreciate it.  Occasionally they would all temporarily agree on some
> phrase or tempo, but like periodic waves of different frequency, they
> would diverge as quickly as they converged (am I from MIT or what :-).

Pity the show was not so hot. Barker is a really good drummer. For a nice
sample of his playing, see his work with Amina Claudine Myers: SALUTES BESSIE
SMITH (Leo 1979) and THE CIRCLE OF TIME (Black Saint 1983)

Enjoy.
-- 
Marcel-Franck Simon		ihnp4!{mhuxr, hl3b5b}!mfs

	" Tu es le boeuf sale', dont mon coeur est la couenne
	  l'acassan au sirop qui coule dans mas garganne "