Flawed individuals who make the music
586537
THE MUD DANCE is a story about friendship, sorrow, and life.  Kenny and Larry became fast friends in grammar school, escaping bullies together and discovering their mutual interest in music.  They formed a rock band.  Kenny was a talented drummer and Larry the extraordinary keyboard player, linked together in music and life from that point forward.  They got ensnared by vanities and false pride as they danced their own mud dance of life.  Switching from the present to the past and back again, Kenny narrates their tumultuous story through soaring highs and terrible lows.  Readers become bedroom moths, caught by the starlight in his music, as Kenny delivers the captivating tale like an explosive drum solo.

The authors vivid descriptions of drugs, sex, and rock-n-roll during the sixties seem real and gritty.  He masterfully unfolds harsh truths about Larrys full history until readers understand the demons that plagued him.

By the end of the story, we hope that Kenny can drag himself out of the past and learn to enjoy life again.  Perhaps the beat of his music will prove harmonious in the end.  One of my favorite lines from the novel was this:  Our eternal rhythm box: no more than one strand on the snare drum of the universe vibrating its strings of harmony or discord with each beat as we move in and out of time.  The character studies of Kenny and Larry give readers a glimpse into rock bands and the flawed individuals who make the music.
1837946
Both of these albums are good.  Stick It is the superior album of the two, but both have worthy songs and excellent performances from a great Big Band.

What really irks me is the audio glitch in the mastering on A Different Drummer.  The CD sounds OK, except for a noticeable mastering flaw at the end of, "Paul's Tune."  At 6:02 the left channel loses all frequency dynamics and suddenly sounds like it's being played over a phone line.  It's muffled and muddy for about 5 or 6 seconds.  That may not sound like much, but when you're listening to a well recorded Jazz album muffled and muddy (and very midrangey) sound at the end of a song is distracting and jarring.  It's unacceptable, and BGO should be embarrassed about such a flaw.

Now that's the only audio flaw I've heard so far, but, still - it's not cool.  Basically what that says is that Andrew Thompson, who mastered the album, never listened to it all the way through.  He wasn't paying attention and must not have really cared, otherwise he would have at least given the album ONE listen all the way through.

That's a shame, because A Different Drummer is only available otherwise on an out of print (and very expensive) Japanese release.
4933433
I stumbled across this band largely by accident, and am a fan of the genre.  On the whole, the album is generally good.  So why the low marks?  The songs are well constructed on this album and the guitar work is generally less redundant than that of the band's more recent releases.  The feature to this album though is indefinately the eerie aura that the infectious keyboard melodies contribute to the album.  While the album is well constructed its achilles heel is the production.  Specifically the guitar and drums.  What happened?  The beat is great and the guitars are searing, however, the mix on this album is extremely poor and the guitar and drums sound as though they are constantly playing through transistor radio.  Parting shot, the album is well written and the songs are good but the poor production makes the album seem lack luster and somewhat disappointing.
1077605
This album has been a bit of a problem for me for a while. I heard about it about a year ago and I sampled a few tracks from the album and was somewhat disappointed with the poor sound quality and slight song forms. Due to this I did not actually purchase the album until a few days ago.

 Listening to the album is unfortunately like listening to the raw tapes for a recording session where all the rough odds and ends, and even incomplete songs have been recorded and left as-is. And Cody takes the overly long albums that have dominated music since the rise of the CD to an extreme; two discs worth of material is far from the ideal 45-minute cohesive album that critics would call a reasonable listening length. Cody also seems to have a problem with staying in tune on a few of the tracks which is off-putting for me as you kinda expect singers at this level to have more control. Furthermore Cody is also one sexist mutha [shut your mouth] if you know what I mean.

 With all these flaws, it would be easy to assume that I do not like the album at all. However, on actually listening to the album with its endless parade of songs of varying musical quality, terrible sound quality and sexist bravado, there is actually a great album hiding within the mess. If the album was trimmed to 12 songs, or if the shorter songs like "Enough of Nothing" and "The Most Beautiful Shame" were actually fleshed out, this could have been a great album. Cody shows an amazing ability to merge '60s psychadelic pop-rock ala the Beatles, '70s soul and a '90s hip-hop/r & b and even some Ben Harper-esque singer/songwriter into a style that is all his own. And the album is grounded in two 'singles' of high quality in "The Seed" (here in its original pre-Roots incarnation) and "Look Good In Leather" that show Cody can write great pop music.

 With all this talent it is unfortunate that Cody has not quite learnt how to be more selective with his material and be a 'tight' craftsmen. Some may say that I am probably being unfair because Cody is 'so real' because he record in lo-fi and the overly ambitious scope is part of the album's charm. While it is true that the overly-long length probably has contributed to its fame, it makes for a frustrating listen and it is only because it is lo-fi that people have been duped into believing it is the best album of all time or whatever.

 To illustrate the point, R Kelly's "R", arguably his best album, is his most sprawling album, touching on pretty much all bases of urban music at its time of release in 1998. Yet, it has been panned occassionally for its sprawl and over-reach. Allmusic.com even said it would be a masterpiece if trimmed. Yet the same site called Cody's album a masterpiece and I'm guessing it is only because it is lo-fi and not a glossy production. I believe sincerely that if Cody had been more selective with his material and whittled it down to one disc, this album would be probably the most wide-reaching and visionary album to be released by an African-American artist since Prince, but as it stands, in spite of Cody's undeniable vision, it is a flawed almost-masterpiece. I am however confident that Cody will release future work that is as ambitious, but with more focus. Then he will be ready to take up the crown as one of the greats.
2352167
Being 78 and having lived through the heyday of stage musicals, I suppose I have a certain bias. However, this does NOT justify The DESTRUCTIVE "modern treatment" given by these performers, many of whom do not appeal to me at all. If they want to ruin some music, have them ruin some of the "modern stuff", SOME of which I consider trash. I am very sorry I listened to it, and even more sorry that I purchased it.
4043419
First of all the good - I enjoy the playing by all the players on this CD. Everyone is solid, and the solos are excellent.

But I have two main problems. First, I find the tunes themselves to be somewhat weak, particularly considering Metheny, Corea, and Burton are all excellent composers, and in fact one of my favorite things about Metheny is his genius with melody. Many melodies are pleasant, but none are especially memorable.

However, the thing that bugs me the most (and I am surprised to not to see it mentioned by others) is that the mix is bad. The piano sounds like it was placed about 20 feet further away than all the other instruments. This is especially noticeable during the piano solos, when it seems like the bass and drums have more presence than the piano, but even in the comping Corea is not well balanced with the others. For example, if both Metheny and Corea are comping, your ears are drawn to Metheny and have to strain to listen to what Corea is doing. Frankly, I am shocked that the CD was released this way.

For a similar type of abum that I think is MUCH better and includes Burton and Metheny with other players, check out the CD  "Reunion".
5928
I bought this album after hearing it on National Public Radio, and was disappointed.  The parts of the cuts they played were the exceptional parts of the album.  As mentioned in the liner notes the album had been in progress for a very long time, but had to be recorded in a hurry - and you can tell that it was.  This man has great promise, especially when one considers how young he is - but just as impulsiveness swindles many a young person of their self and wealth, the feeling that an album must be cut at any cost still boils down to impulsiveness.  And the album suffers.  A fan of World Music of all kinds which includes a fondness for Fusion Music, it hurts me to say that this album does a great disservice to a very talented man.  The musicianship is fair, the spirit exceptional, and the mixing very poor, almost crass.  Three stars because two are unfair, and four would reward poor engineering and mixing.  The man has great talent and vision.  Perhaps his next album will show better judgment in understanding the process of recording.  The compositions are good, the recording is poor.  And it is a shame that the artist must suffer because the impulse to record forced a poor rendering  good music and great talent.
3665137
A band manufactured by Simon Cowell from American Idol and sounds exactly how you would expect. Sell with whiney screams from LA bimbos. This is an insult to every real band that started from true musicians.
3653817
GREAT playing, but everyone once in a while some retard starts moaning and making bizare sounds that the engineer should have gotten rid of... oh wait, that is the piano player...  what a schmuck...  there, I said it... what MANY people have been meaning to say... Keith is so freakin' great if he just shut up when he played.  The occasional moan is fine, but come on.
4802767
In the notes there's recorded a conversation about a hearer commenting that Frank Chace sounded like Pee Wee Russell and another hearer felt that Frank wasn't very good.  I would have to agree with both of them.  He holds back and makes mediocre an otherwise pretty good jazz band.
2909125
A Capella can be hit or miss in many cases, but the way these ladies' voices resonate during the song would make instruments superfluous.
4657004
Generally, the performance is not very untolerable. What makes me a little dissatisfied is the oboe (and the clarinet) tones which sound in some places less powerful than are necessary and the melodies they delineate are ambiguous from time to time.
2419145
These are all great players, Al, Dex, Barry, are some of my very favorite players, and the music they put down on tape in these sessions is first rate. But the sound quality and balance is quite unsatisfactory, to the point of serious irritation. There's a hard edge to the sound of the horns, and they're mixed much louder than the rhythm section, especially Barry's piano. He's one of the most important musical presences here, yet he's buried in the ensemble and you've got to turn the volume up to hear his solos, then turn it back down so that the horns don't blow you out if the room. All the stars are for the music, which deserves five, and the missing stars are for the engineer(s) who made a mess of it.
2756769
If folk had a kid with country, and reggae had a child with alternative acoustic and by some chance their kids met and bore a child. Poor Man's Poison would make that child his bitch.
4237343
First of all, I am rather disgusted with the extremities of reviews of Miss Church's CD. It is true that those who are writing spiteful reviews come across as nothing but jealous, but those who rave for the most part have an obvious lack of vocal training or knowledge of good critical assessment.  Simply being a "music lover" doesn't mean a thing when it comes to assessing an artists overall skill, because the way a voice sounds is unimportant compared to the technique that gives that voice its foundation. C.C. has a very lovely sound that falters on few occasions. However, it worries me that she has such a mature sound at her age because it is physically impossible for her rich vibrato to be natural, as her vocal instrument is still very immature. And when the voice is forced to have a certain type of sound that has not yet naturally occured (esp. when vibrato is purposely created),damage IS occuring the whole time, although you may not feel or hear the damage for a few years. YOu cannot compare other child musician prodigies of instruments like the cello or piano to one of the voice because those are not instruments that must mature over a period of many (about 15-25) years starting at puberty (which would render Church's voice about 2 years old, at most).  Undoubtedly, C.C. is ahead of most other singers of her age in stage presence, talent, and vocal control.  However it is that present Control that could give this singer a very short-lived career, a fact that I hope she becomes aware of before her voice is permantely damaged. If you buy this CD, which is certainly pleasant to listen to, it should be simply for entertainment and not as any kind of model or example of good, healthy vocal technique.
1190740
I'm a fan of Armin van Buuren's stuff, so I thought this would be another album for my collection. The songs are good, except for one glaring flaw: all of them have the audience cheering and whistling throughout parts of the tracks. I couldn't believe it. It made it really hard to listen to, which is tragic because it's otherwise good. If you can tolerate shrill whistling (almost like it was recorded live, but I'm not sure that it was), you may want to check this out.
777722
The two star reviewer is right, I'm afraid; there's a high pitched hiss throughout. It's not super obvious, but it's there, negatively impacting the sound and the listener's experience. The playing is great. It's a short album at 33 minutes.