Moody’s Mood Is A Sad One For Jazz Lovers

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Philadelphia Record Exchange had a bunch of nice 10-inch Prestige LPs up this week and someone sent me a link. I took a look and there were several nice James Moody records that looked to be in nice condition and were not getting much action. I’ve never quite understood why the Moody Prestiges and Blue Notes never have much cachet among collectors, but the reality is they don’t. So I bid on the first two that came up and I won them both, under a nom de plume you may not recognize, and I’m hoping to win the third. The prices, in my view, were quite fair. I shared my good fortune with a friend, who sent me a link to this article: Jazz legend James Moody battling cancer. Sounds like we will soon be losing another great one and one of the last remaining links to the dawn of the bebop era.

Guest Column: Record Shopping in Japan

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In a comment last week one of our loyal readers asked if he could write a guest column about his experiences buying vinyl in Japan. So without further ado, we offer:

Record Shopping in Japan
By Mike Falcon

For most of my adult life I have been very interested in Japanese culture.  I love their movies, art, food, culture, and overall aesthetics.  I studied Japanese while in college as my obligatory foreign language and have traveled there a few times.  Something I have found very interesting about Japan is how they appreciate American and Western culture.  Japan is very different from America or Europe but as a society they have a very deep appreciation for key things from these cultures.  It was so amazing to me to eat various Western foods in Japan and find that the Japanese do Italian, French, Brazilian, and Spanish food more authentically than is available in the U.S.  I ate in a small Italian restaurant where the chef took pride in his Italian food on a level I think could only be found in Italy itself.  For me the Japanese appreciation of Western culture is most evident in three of “my favorite things:” Jazz, vinyl and baseball.   I will save you from my interesting and wonderful experiences with Japanese baseball and other observations because this in an article about vinyl hunting.

The Japanese, relative to the U.S., have a lot of record and CD stores.   I don’t believe they have suffered the same setbacks as the American record industries have, as the music store business seems much healthier.  In Tokyo you can find corporate-owned music and DVD stores eight stories tall that would take a day or more to explore.  These places were interesting but I found the small record stores

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Some More Jazz Vinyl For the $1,000 Bin

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There’s quite a bit of jazz vinyl to catch up on, which will be have to do in a few posts, so let’s start simply this morning with the $1,000 bin, much of which, it seems, we predicted.

Kenny Dorham, Quiet Kenny, New Jazz 8225. This was an original pressing in VG++ condition for both the record and cover and, as noted, it had the promo stamp. It sold for $1,525. Probably would have gotten more without the promo stamp.

Dexter Gordon, Dexter Blows Hot and Cool, Dootone 207. This was an original pressing with the red vinyl. The record was VG+ and the cover was listed in VG+, although there was a full split on the bottom and a partial split on the top. There was some question whether this would prevent it from breaking the $1,000 barrier, but it did not: This one sold for $1,136.

This one had it all going for it: Helen Merrill, Emarcy 36006. It was an original pressing, with the blue writing on the back cover, the seller was Euclid Records and the pictures accompanying the listing were quite clear and bright. The price was $1,568.

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A Random Post of Favorite Jazz Vinyl

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This is a completely random post. At the WFMU Record Fair last week I was selling a copy of Miles Davis Steamin’ on Prestige and got into a discussion with a buyer and he said, of the Steamin’/Workin’/Cookin’/Relaxin’ group of albums that Steamin’ was his least favorite. I said, hmm, that’s interesting because Steamin’ is my favorite of the group. He eventually purchased Steamin’ from me and I’m hoping he’s pleased. In any case, I’m sitting here in my home office/music room staring at my records and thinking about some of my favorites from among the artists where I have (1) a lot a records and (2) clear favorites. Looking through the records, I realized for some artists – such as Lee Morgan, Hank Mobley even Horace Silver – I don’t have any single record that stands above the others. If pressed, I could name a favorite, which I will not do for those artists, but which I will do for some of the other artists where the choices, for me at least, are more clearcut. Some may be obvious, some more obscure, some may even be ridiculous to others, but these are the ones I like. Staring at my collection, looking at them in alphabetical order, here goes nothing:

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Tracking Four For the $1,000 Bin

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Here is some jazz vinyl we are watching now on eBay that we expect will end up in the proverbial $1,000 bin:

Kenny Dorham, Quiet Kenny, New Jazz 8225. This is an original pressing with the deep grooves and purple label and it is a promo copy as well. The seller has it listed in VG++ condition for both the record and the cover and the bidding is already more than $700 with five days to go. This will end up in the $2,000 bin, won’t it?

This one may end up there as well: Dexter Gordon, Dexter Blows Hot and Cool, Dootone 207. This is an original pressing with the red vinyl. The record is VG+ and the cover is VG++. This one is around $200 and there are still five days of bidding.

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Day Three (Not) At The WFMU Record Fair

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So, after more than an hour of live rock music blasting in my ears, I decided to bag it at the WFMU Record Fair after Saturday, so I packed my records, loaded them in my Prius and drove them home. But what was I to do with them next? There were a dozen boxes of records, probably 700 altogether, plus another 500 or 600 records already in the house or in storage that are to be sold. I’ve bought three collections in the past year, and I have at least that many duplicates or reissues or records I simply don’t want. Previously, I’ve been selling records on eBay, but my real work has gotten quite busy and I’m not doing that anymore, so it seemed I was facing the prospect of just putting all of these records in storage and waiting another year for the next WFMU Record Fair so I could sell 100 of them while getting bombarded with close range music of mass destruction.

It is at times like this when I wish I had a record store.

Then, on Sunday morning at 6 a.m., on what would have been Day Three of the WFMU Record Fair, I woke up startled with a clear revelation. I would

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Day Two At the WFMU Record Fair

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I mentioned that my table was towards the back at the WFMU Record Fair this weekend. There were some clear disadvantages to this location. For one, the front of the room was mobbed and there was a lot of jazz at almost every table, so by the time people made it to my side of the room – if, indeed, they did make it at all – they were pretty jazzed out, and perhaps even all spent out with no more cash in their wallets. The second disadvantage to my location was the unfortunate reality that it was close to where the WFMU people had set up their live broadcast, which meant there was loud music and gab incessantly in my ears from 10 in the morning through the day. All of which was pretty bad.

And then it got worse.

Sometime in the later afternoon, perhaps 3 p.m. or so, they decided to have live music: Yes a rock band, followed by another rock band, each one trying to out-noise the other. Or so it seemed to these delicate, jazz-oriented ears. Loud doesn’t begin to describe what it was like at my table. The Read more

Day One At the WFMU Record Fair

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So yesterday was Day One of the WFMU Record Fair in New York City and I purchased a dealer table to sell of duplicates from my collection and other odds and ends and this was my experience.

There was a time, when I was an compulsive buyer of records – as opposed to now, when I am merely an obsessive buyer of records – when I would purchase a dealer’s table at a record show just so that I could show up early and look at the other dealers’ records before anyone else. I’d get there and hover while dealers of jazz records would be unpacking their wares and I could get first shot at their offerings. Don’t laugh – I got some mighty nice records this way.

Now, however, I am more serene about it. I didn’t get there yesterday until 3:30 and the show opened at four to early arrivals so I barely had time to even look. In fact, I convinced myself that the only reason I was looking at all was so that I could write about it here at Jazz Collector. I even made certain that I would not be buying either compulsively or obsessively or both: I only brought $100.

So at 3:30 I began roaming the floor with my $100. What struck me was that just about every table had jazz records: Some a box or two, some had many, many boxes. And it was a lot of the stuff

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Back on eBay: Lee, Bird, Newk and Mr. PC

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It’s been days since we caught up on eBay, so let’s take a look and see what’s been going on:

There was this one that came close to the $1,000 bin: Lee Morgan Sextet, Blue Note 1541. This was an original Lexington Avenue pressing that was listed in VG++ condition for the vinyl and VG+ for the cover. It sold for $919.

We were also watching a bunch of records from the seller bobjdukic, which is always an interesting pastime. In a way you have to admire his ability to promote a 1978 Savoy reissue of Charlie Parker as an original and get someone to pay a fairly decent collectible price. Case in point: Charlie Parker, The Complete Savoy Studio Sessions, a boxed set issued in 1978 by Arista Records. This sold for $112.50. This one seemed to get a fair price: Sonny Rollins With the Modern Jazz Quartet, Prestige 7029. This was a New York pressing with the yellow cover. An original first press would have the orange cover and the kakubshi cover. This one seems to

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See You At the Fair?

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For the past few weeks I have been cleaning and packing and pricing records in anticipation of the WFMU Record Fair, which will begin next Friday at the Metropolitan Pavilion in New York. I’ve had a table at this fair a couple of times before. I’m not a dealer, but I have hundreds of duplicates so I use this as a way to get rid of records that I either don’t want to sell on eBay or, more likely, don’t have time to sell on eBay. If you are in the New York area next weekend it’s definitely worth a visit. I’ve always found nice jazz there — usually I buy more than I sell but, hey, I am a Jazz Collector, right? I’ll also have some nice items to sell as well because I’ve bought a couple of collections in the past year and I haven’t been selling on eBay in months, so it will all be fresh new inventory no one has ever seen. Perhaps even a couple of original Blue Notes. The fair starts with early admission on Friday at 4 p.m. and goes through Sunday evening. And if you’re there, you better come say hi, right?

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