Jupiter Jazz and Vintage Vinyl Mind Melters

So, my journey with jazz has been a long on and off type relationship.  I'll just man up and say it's my fault.  I could blame it on a number of things..ignorance, impatience, immaturity..blah, blah.  But if i could be even more self centered for a second, I'm not traveling on jazz's journey.  It's traveling on  mine.  I have this image of my grandfather sitting on the porch after the sun had set and everybody had finished eating this obscenely delicious meal prepared by hands that knew what to do with what they had.  And after the kitchen had been emptied of kids and aunts, and the dishes, the same ones my Mama ate off when she grew up there, were all cleaned and put away, we kids would be outside in the dark yard catching fireflies and runnin' off some of them carbs and Grandad would be on that porch with his ubiquitous pipe and heady, flavorful smoke listening to jazz.  That was a cool dude and I didn't really know how cool until reflection and hindsight.

Growing up in New York, I remember Mom and Pops collection consisted of soul, disco and R&B but was still pretty varied.  They had all the stuff that people play at parties and cookouts to this day to rock the house.  Everything from Temps, Marvin Gaye and Stevie and alot of Motown in general to the Spinners, Earth Wind and Fire, et. al.  The only jazz i really remember was more contemporary type jazz like Quincy Jones, Chuck Mangione, Herb Alpert, Grover Washington, etc.  It wasn't until i was experimenting with sampling that I really first started "seeing" what the jazz was offering.  This was when my friends and i would start "collecting" vinyl from various sources.  Which, by the way, seemed easier back then because by that time numerous technologies had come, and gone in some cases, since vinyl, like 8-track, cassette and just before cd's were popular.  Many people viewed their vinyl collections as bulky and cumbersome and collectors of dust.  Now they're considered "vintage" and you can see $50 price tags or better on some stuff.  Shit, not the kid.  I won't pay more than 10 bucks for it.  Just a rule.

Anyway, back in those mad scientist, crate diggin', sample-chopping halcyon all-nighters, many times we didn't listen to the whole album or song.  When i say "we" i mean my production crew "The Black Hippies" which was me, Serious, Mr. Beats, Aloe, and Maestro, although everyone has since gone their own ways and surely developed their own thing.  But for me i rarely listened to the whole joint.  I know, a travesty, right?  It wasn't until i matured more musically that i began to "see" the music and the musicianship.  What MC's call freestyling, which is improvised and impromptu rhyme, was already being done by jazz cats..with instruments. This was CREATION!!  In my mind it's a microcosm of creation in the highest order. A simple melody (atom, molecule, quark, gobbledy-gook..) and the cosmic spark to imagine it being something else.  Something unique and beautiful and....a "uniquely American" institution, as i recently heard it described.  Ok.

Today my collection is...eh, i got a few.  Not as many as some folks' that I've seen.  I have been enriched by recordings from Milt Jackson, Modern Jazz Quartet (MJQ), Jazz Brothers, Art Blakey, Herbie Hancock, Chick Corea, Miles, Weather Report, Lee Morgan...pfft, i could go on.  I can only endeavor to create good music and in full expression of my self be myself.  There is so much plastic passed off as popular music because people are lazy.  Folks don't do enough "crate-diggin'" anymore.  There is some really good gems of hip hop out there that i call Jupiter Jazz and i know that many of the jazz folk are set as to what is jazz and what isn't and i respect that but in my world good music is good music and let everyone else worry about what to label it or what box to fit it in comfortably or not so.

"Pendulum Slave" - Cor Stidak

Thanks for coming. While you're here...

Born day and inauguration all wrapped up in one for this lil slice o' reality in the robes of a blog.  But let's face it, all this is supposed to be IS a slice of reality...relatively speaking.  I could go on but let's just get this thing rolling.  Here i will document life, thoughts and ideas, and stories that resonate with me.  I hope to grow and shed light not necessarily to an audience (who, in essence, would be an extension of my own thoughts anyway..sheesh), but to and for myself as well and mainly.

Anyone who knows a particular facet of me, knows that i have a lifelong love of music and art.  Well, since i'm still living and alive i still have those loves.  I have had the pleasure of knowing and being inspired personally by some beautiful and amazing people.  Not only by their talents but also by their artistry in the way they make a path for themselves and turn turn thoughts not just into daydreams but into concrete realities.  Is that not a microcosm or analogous toThe Creation (if one should believe in such a thing) or conception or a big bang, or something?   (I'm not high, i swear!!)

Moving right along...the STIDAK project is my music meditation.  I'll get into the name Stidak in another post.  If you're reading this, there's a good chance it's because of Stidak.  I have been quite private and insular with my craft for the past 7 years.  Not because of any ego(i don't think..) or lack of opportunity, but because i tend to operate in cycles and also because i just became uninspired and felt like everything around me was manufactured and processed for forgettable fast food  "fulfillment"(?) and folly.  I don't think i was that wrong.  I don't think i'd go so far as to say "HIP HOP IS DEAD",  though i appreciate the brother's intent.  People keep accepting mediocrity and bullshit and while art is universal, and expression is beautiful, and everyone should be able to express themselves, not everyone expresses artfully.  My blog..my opinion, though, huh?  I'm know what i do will not resonate with everyone.  But peace, just the same.  The album title is "13 Treatises of a PENdulum Slave."  I will make songs available for download in the coming days and weeks on a few different sites.  Links to come.  I worked with a friend or two and got a couple beats from some cats in Pittsburg and a link up from Switzerland by way of SF..haha.  But the rest is SEE CYPH production.  Much more to come.

"..subliminal punishment through media coverage,
24 hour access to your puzzle grid,
the grand wizard, vampiric man-lizard
stand rigid and examine my kilogram lyrics.."
-  COR STIDAK,  "wind of change"