Fashion appreciation from Thelonious Monk

Via Boing Boing -

Among Thelonious Monk's many gifts was his fashion sense. While his own duds are pretty sharp, here, he shows his admiration for saxophonist Johnny Griffin's fabulous Danish pants, from, I'm guessing 1967. Sadly, no color film exists of this clip.

Playlist for the Unpopular Music Webcast for October 14, 2017

Today we commemorate the one-hundredth anniversary of the birth of Thelonious Monk, one of the singular jazz pianists and composers and a personal idol of mine. If pressed to bestow such a ridiculous title, I would say he's my favorite musician ever.




However, thanks to our old friend the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, we cannot play more than four tracks credited to any one artist in the time allotted for the webcast, so, as with our Ornette Coleman tribute a couple of years back, we necessarily focus on Monk the composer.

Top 4 for September 4, 2014

Short and sweet today, little if any explanation --

Bad Mango - Dave Douglas and Sō Percussion

from album of the same name, Vol. 3 of Dave's GPS set.

Let's Call This - Thelonious Monk 

from the famous Friday the 13th, 1953  session. One of your better bebop French horn solos. I always confuse this song with "Let's Cool One". This is the trickier and less often played one.

Program notes for the May 10, 2014 Unpopular Music webcast

The blog seems to have gotten away from “top [fill-in-the-blank] of [today's date]” format, which was really the format of the (off-line) music journal I'd been keeping for myself, largely as a writing exercise (itself, largely as an effort to “just do something”). The process of singling out a song, or two, or five, or whatever to write about has largely been replaced by adding said two-to-whatever songs to the playlist for the next webcast. So now, to get some more writing done, and, let's face it, create some more “content” for the blog, I'm going to try (at least this week) to write some “program notes” for the webcast.

I first heard Katie Lee singing Real Sick Sounds on a compilation called “Beat Jazz - Pictures from the Gone World volume 2” and enjoyed it's depiction of the lover of dissonant and off-beat music. Further research led me to the album “Songs of Couch and Consultation” a sort-of song cycle of psychologically themed songs which also include The Will to Fail, the Guilty Rag, Shrinker Man, and others, collectively a hoot-and-a-holler.

No. 1 for January 3, 2014

American Hustle directed by David O. Russell

Some fine acting from across the ensemble, especially Jennifer Lawrence as the loose cannon homebody housewife who almost blows everything (she's the gun from the first act that goes of in the third) and Jeremy Renner as the crooked politician with a heart of gold, excepting for some cringes from Christian Bale's impersonation of Robert De Niro circa 1980. Any movie that has characters bonding over Jeep's Blues, falling in love even, gets a big gold star from me. (Also, another scene is scored with Monk playing Straight, No Chaser. The source music selections are so well chosen throughout, that when Danny Elfman's credit came up, I actually said “wait, there was original music in this movie, too?” I can't recall any.) 

I also will now only refer to the microwave as the “science oven” from this point on.

No. 1 for January 1, 2014

The Man I Love performed by Coleman Hawkins' Swing Four, from Coleman Hawkins: 1943-1944

One of Thelonious' first recordings (from 1943) is a swingin' double-time-feel chorus-and-a-half (which also hints at Criss-Cross) leading into a fine solo from a heavy breathing bass player before the leader takes it out. They don't do it like this anymore and you shouldn't even try.

Top 5 for September 15, 2013

Sugar Boy – Beth Orton 

from a collection of performances in KCRW's Morning Becomes Eclectic

Blue Monk – Thelonious Monk Quartet w/ John Coltrane at Carnegie Hall

An unusual treatment of the melody. Coltrane seems to be playing a counter melody or inner voice. Fine solos from both.

This must be the place (Naive Melody) – Talking Heads from Popular Favorites 1976-1983 (aka Sand in the Vaseline)

One of their finest moments is from their weakest album. The best songs are done better on Stop Making Sense and this song is on any "best of" collection. This is the best such collection, band selected with a bunch of otherwise unreleased tracks. If I recall correctly, this was the b-side to Burning Down the House. Play it at my wedding if I ever have one.