The Supper Table

I first heard a track from this album-- her version of Marvin Gaye's Inner City Blues -- on a West Coast Soul mixtape in 95.  The first time I saw the album I had to buy it for the cover alone, but quickly fell in love with the material, especially That's the Way I Always Heard it Should Be and On Thinking it Over .  This was Sarah's 70's re-invention album, her first 'mainstream' release.  It's timeless and gorgeous, soulful and worth owning. Sarah Vaughn A Time in My Life Side 2 1 That's the Way I Always Heard it Should Be 2 Tomorrow City 3 Universal Prisoner 4 Trouble 5 If Not For You

Ida is one of my favorite bands, especially of the sometimes sad, emotional, harmonious, and always beautiful variety.  In terms of how I classify music, they are a CD band.  Their releases consistently deserve a complete listening, and even as I set out to hear one song, regardless of the album, I almost always listen to the whole album.  A song is an infection, and the only cure is more of the same.  It would be easier just accepting the inevitable, putting on a CD and listening until it ends, but I buy them on vinyl.  I know that I won't play them when I dj and that my stereo is of such a quality that the only real distinction between vinyl and CDs are the occasional pops of the vinyl, but I can't help myself.  I think it's the intimacy; the need to go over, gently hold the record, touch it, releasing the music on the other side.  That sounds kinda dirty, but it isn't, it's more like the embrace of true beauty, a pause to consider and appreciate th...

From the inner jacket: The Liquid Crystal Project is a figment of J. Rawls imagination. For a long time, I have had this vision of a different type of jazz and hip-hop fusion.  I like to call this version, Jazz-hop, because it is jazzy with all the elements of hip-hop inside it.  It's most evident in the drums!  The boom-bap of hip-hop from (sic) is present.  Put those two together and it's so right! This is something for the thirty-something cats that yearn for a more mature music. We grew up on hip-hop and live for the boom-bap, but we don't really have any tolerance for the nonsense most rappers are talking about today.  This is for the hip-hop connoisseur that can appreciate good hip-hop merged with a touch of jazz. I would like to welcome you to my imagination, jazzhop; THE LIQUID CRYSTAL PROJECT! This is an album made for the cd format.  It's a great listen from beginning to end, mature hip-hop, spring music that makes the need for gett...

I borrowed this CD from the Seattle Public Library and became obsessed.  I listened to it repeatedly until it was due, rechecked it and listened until I had no choice but to return it.  I then went in search of it on vinyl.  I searched for a year and a half, and finally found it for $75 through a mail order record shop.  Just as I had convinced myself it was worth it, I found it for $15.  I love this album.  It's soulful, jazzy, touching and sweet with just the right amount of schmaltz.  It's Betty Carter's recording debut, and her voice with Ray's is amazing. Ray Charles and Betty Carter side 1 1 Ev'ry Time We Say Goodbye 2 You and I 3 Intro: Goodbye/ We'll Be Together Again 4 People Will Say We're in Love 5 Cocktails for Two 6 Side By Side

Roberta Flack's "First Time I Ever Saw Your Face" was a ubiquitous part of my childhood.  One of those songs that played so constantly, in so many random places, that it had become part of the background, like muzak.  I had stopped hearing it, I'm not sure if I had ever listened to it.  And then I did.  It's so much better than I ever realized.  The entire album is a collection of beautiful and subtle work.  Roberta's voice is wielded like an instrument, both brass and string, woven into the fabric of the music instead of rising above it.  Ron Carter's bass work is amazing, huge and spacious.  His work on "I Told Jesus' along with the strings and horns make the traditional number timeless. Roberta Flack First Take Side 1 Compared to What Angelitos Negros Our Ages or Our Hearts I Told Jesus

The first radio show I had in college was a jazz show. At the time I really knew nothing about the music, just a few names. Every week I would pull records for a few hours, mostly based on familiar names and album covers, and then I would spend a few hours listening to tracks. As my knowledge and the show evolved, Charles Mingus' Better Git it in Your Soul became my opening song, my theme song in a sense. It feels like church gospel, on your feet hands clapping, head dipping to the beat. This song was my door way to Mingus' work, and through him to people like Eric Dolphy and Booker Ervin. It is because of a growing love of Mingus that I sought out Money Jungle, and took a deeper look at the life and work of Duke Ellington. It all started with the first track in this entry. Charles Mingus Ah Um side 1 1 Better Git It In Your Soul 2 Goodbye Porkpie Hat 3 Boogie Step Shuffle 4 Self-Portrait In Three Colors 5 Open Letter to Duke

I am generally ambivalent about live albums. They don't often offer enough to distinguish them from their studio antecedents, beyond audience applause, and lack the energy of being present. Nina at Newport is one of those exceptions. Little Liza Jane is infectiously energetic. I can't listen without imagining women catching the holy ghost around me, and You'd Be So Nice to Come Home To is a career making song, that almost no one has heard. I'm not sure if she ever recorded this in the studio, but her performance makes it feel like a Nina standard. I was single the first time I heard this song, it was winter, and this song made me wish I was in love and had someone for whom to play it. The long piano intro giving way to "you'd be so nice to come home to," and all I could think was, 'that's what I want.' So straight-forward, so simple, love is always so much easier in song. Nina Simone at Newport side1 Trouble in Mind Porgy Little...