things and time will tell.

Various Artists – Absolute Beginners - The Musical (Songs From The Original Motion Picture) EMI America – SV-17182 Vinyl, LP, US, 1986 info Sade fans aren't impatient. The group's first four albums came out within about 8 years, between 1984 and 1992. After that though, they pumped the breaks and slowed their album release schedule to roughly once per decade. Their last studio release was 2010's Soldier Of Love and, although I think they're still officially an active group, I've never heard news, leaks, or promises of a new record coming despite the twelve year gap. I don't read enough interviews or music news to have a clue whether that's attributed to perfectionism, semi-retirement, writer's block or what, but they don't owe me anything and I appreciate their (very high) quality over quantity. There's been the occasional "best of" compilation or vinyl reissue, but we haven't even seen "deluxe edition" cash-ins packed wit...

  I have an enormous, almost obsessive, appetite for new music. Hunting for everything I can find featuring a musician, producer or style that caught my ear is a habit that probably keeps me from really giving half the attention and listening time deserved by records that come my way. Even so, there are albums, artists and songs that I always go back to, the records that have wound up holding special places (roles?) in my listening and life. Pharoah Sanders has been near the top of that list for a long time, since F first introduced me to the saxophone legend as teenager (by giving me a  Best Of Pharoah Sanders  double LP  that I still treasure).  Maybe it's really some COVID era awareness of mortality, but it feels like there been a shocking number of musicians that I've been moved and influenced by who have passed away in the last two or three years. It still felt especially tragic though when I heard the news that Pharoah Sanders had died last week. From his ...