(Music can be ordered from Amazon.com Books -- click on the album cover)

10 Other Favorite Records

(March 2001)

This site has done pretty well, for a one-afternoon knockoff four years ago. So, to placate the many people who requested, a followup of 10 More Favorite Records. These are CDs that I have gotten special pleasure from in my life, and recommend to you without reservation. To order, just click on the picture.

1/2 
Tim Hardin

This is a two-fer, the first two albums made by this very affecting, very perplexing singer of the 60s, who took his life in the 70s. All his best songs are here: "Misty oses," "Reason to Believe," "Tribute to Hank WIlliams," "Red Balloon." Few singers connect with people emotionally the way Tim Hardin did. But I guess he was an outrage in his personal life -- nearly the opposite of the soulful fellow in the songs.

To The Bone
The Kinks

Two sides of a live concert in 1996 -- when they should have been dead. Instead, it is the rippingest, most joyful live record I think I own. If these guys ever were it for you, the way they were for me in 1964-65, this set will paint a lurid smile on your face.

Panthalassa: The Music Of Miles Davis 1969-1974
Miles Davis (Tribute), Bill Laswell

I'm not such a fan of most of Laswell's dub experiments, but this is a masterpiece of what can be done in the editing room. Laswell took tapes of Miles Davis' best fusion sessions and recreated them as ambient music. I prize this as among my favorite Davis recordings. It's the original music, let loose.

The Blue Moods Of Spain
Spain

This group is led by Charlie Haden's son Josh, and it is an exquisite album of bass-driven ballads. The hit song, "Spiritual," appeared as an instrumental on Charlie's wonderful collaboration with Pat Metheny, Beyond the Missouri Sky.

Song For My Father 
Horace Silver

Pianist Horace Silver is a jazz mainstay of the 60s and 70s, and this is his most accessible, most tuneful record. Recognize the piano leitmotif in the title song -- Steely Dan based their hit "Rickie Don't Lose that Number" on it.

Re-Inventions: Best Of The Vanguard Years
Sandy Bull

Poor Sandy Bull. Like so many of my favorites, he was a brilliant soloist who offed himself when the world did not drape itself at his feet. These songs arte so powerfully imagined -- "Carmina Burana," "Manha de Carnival," and the beauteous "Blend." Masterpieces all.

Accordion Tribe

Guy Klucevsek (United States), Maria Kalaniemi (Finland), Bratko Bibic (Slovenia), Lars Hollmer (Sweden), and Otto Lechner (Austria) all come from different nations, different backgrounds, and indeed, very different genres of music. Ypou won't believe the stunning compositions on this very unusual record.

The San Bernardino Birthday Party
John Fahey

I remember when I first heard the broad strum of Fahey's "San Bernardino Birthday Party" in 1966, at a poet's house in Cleveland. John Fahey elevated the blues to the level of the sacred, and gave the music his all, in between drinks. This album is one Fahey personally didn't think much of it. But he is wrong, and it is great -- soaring cathedral bottleneck blues and weird 60s electronics. He died this year, impoverished. But oh the riches of his best work, this and Legend of Blind Joe Death.

Upper Egypt
Wayne Horvitz & Zony Mash

Nearly any recording by avant-garde saxophonist and composer Wayne Horvitz is worthy of attention. His arrangements are very simple, very open, very visual. But this one is especially sweet, with its loving reshaping of Pharaoh Sanders' classic "Upper Egypt."

My 10 Favorite Records

June 1996

Availability: This title usually ships within 24 hours.

Audio CD
Review: Sweet Jane, what a record this is, the Velvets' best by my reckoning, which makes it maybe the best rock and roll record ever. Slow lovely doowop numbers, the chunky rhythms of "What Goes On," the delicate lyrics of "Some Kind of Love," and others. You feel like you're disappearing into Lou Reed's soul.

Label: Pgd/A&M
Released: May 7, 1996
ASIN: B000002G7G

Availability: This title usually ships within 2-3 days.

Audio CD
Review: Sumptuous trumpet jazz. Not as rigorous as Miles, but richer emotionally. Isham brings a remarkable gift of exploration and dreaminess to his compositions. I have all his records, and there are a lot of them, including soundtracks.

Label: Sony Music
Released: October 3, 1995
ASIN: B000002B7D

Availability: This title usually ships within 24 hours.

Audio CD
Review: Someone asked me in 1969 what my favorite all-time record was, and I thought it was this set, at the height of Jefferson Airplane's wiggy trip. Sounds a bit mannered now, but always interesting and relentlessly original.

Label: Bmg/Rca
Released: January 30, 1996
ASIN: B000002WVQ

Availability: This title usually ships within 24 hours.

Audio CD
Review: Most folks cite Eno's Another Green World as his masterpiece, but this is the one that wraps me up. Oblique strategies, tape loops, that odd voice, and the titanic chops and creativity of Brian Eno. Just great listening.

Label: Eg
Released: September 18, 1989
ASIN: B000003S0R

Availability: This title usually ships within 2-3 days.

Audio CD
Review: The best record of torch songs I've ever heard. Collins isn't a classically good singer, but her song choices here are terrific -- Donovan, John Lennon, Kurt Weill, Leonard Cohen, Jacques Brel. It's great sad music.

Label: Wea/Elektra Entertainment
Released: May 3, 1988
ASIN: B000002I2D

Availability: This title usually ships within 2-3 days.

Audio CD
Review: This disk is a sampler of the strange and interesting music Nick Drake made in the late 1960s. Afflicted by terrible depression, Drake went his own way as a songwriter. His songs seem wistful rather than sad. If you like this collection -- and how could you not -- you will want to have the other four LPs he made before committing suicide at 24.

Label: Hannibal/Carthage
Released: October 4, 1994
ASIN: B00000062O

Availability: This title usually ships within 2-3 days.

Audio CD
Review: Music of soul perfection. Is there any doubt who Belle is? My friend Brit Robson and I agree that this is Green's best record, and that Green is the best singer of soul music, and the most reliably great pop singer, album to album, who ever lived.

Label: Hi (Uk)
Released: September 27, 1994
ASIN: B0000058Z2

Availability: This title usually ships within 2-3 days.

Audio CD
Review: Languorous chamber jazz led by Sweden's greatest bassist and composer. I love to work to this.

Label: Bmg/Ecm
Released: October 25, 1994
ASIN: B0000031RT

Availability: This title usually ships within 24 hours.

Audio CD
Review: I know this is a great record, but everyone I lend it to flips it back to me. What am I feeling that they don't feel? This guy is the best rock poet since Patti Smith, and his band is astonishing. Think of it as Verlaine meets Led Zeppelin, a music of great yearning. He died in a swimming accident last summer, and it threw me into a tizzy. I so wanted to hear more music from him.

Label: Sony Music
Released: August 23, 1994
ASIN: B0000029DD

Availability: This title usually ships within 4-6 weeks.

Music csst Edition
Audio Cassette
Review: John McLaughlin has made many records, some of them wonderful, like the first two Mahavishnu Orchestra LPs. But here is his treasure, 50 minutes of acoustic meditative splendor, including a luscious version of Charles Mingus' "Goodbye Porkpie Hat." Must be heard to be believed.

Published by Baker & Taylor Video
Publication date: February 1988
ISBN: 6301127994