🎷 AotW: CTI Kai Winding & J.J. Johnson - Stonebone (reserved for SP-3027)

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Captain Bacardi

Well-Known Member
1647196172376.pngKai Winding & J.J. Johnson
STONEBONE

A&M/CTi SP-3027



Another A&M/CTi catalog number that was never released in the US, although there are unsubstantiated rumors that it was released in Japan, even though no one can find any art work and not one copy has ever surfaced.

Allegedly, the tracks recorded for this album were:

Taurus (J.J. Johnson)
Dontcha Hear Me Callin' To Ya? (Rudy Stevenson)
Mojo (J.J. Johnson)
Anticipation
Ballad In C Minor (J.J. Johnson)
Ding (Kai Winding)
Recollections (Joe Zawinul)

The musicians included on this are supposedly:
Kai Winding - Trombone
J.J. Johnson - Trombone
Herbie Hancock - Keyboards
Bob James - Keyboards
George Benson - Guitar
Ron Carter - Bass
Grady Tate - Drums
Ross Tompkins - Keyboards


The above information was found at the following site: CTI DISCOGRAPHY: 1967-1969

Hopefully, one day this album will see the light of day!



Capt. Bacardi



1647196355266.pngUpdate, 2020

This record was released in 1970 in Japan as AML-330. (Pictured at right.)

In October, 2020, it was reissued on vinyl for the first time, but no digital release is available as of yet. (Reissued LP pictured above.) The US had a red vinyl release, with the Europe release allegedly on blackberry-colored vinyl.

The musician listing above is correct.

The track listing:
  1. Dontcha Hear Me Callin' To Ya?
  2. Musings
  3. Mojo
  4. Recollections
The label design of the reissue copies the typeface and layout of the original vinyl version from Japan.

1647196650268.png




Hear the complete album here:

 
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Rudy said:
A&M SP3027 J.J. & Kai
STONEBONE
SP3027 (UNRELEASED)

Any comments on this non-US-released rarity? :wink:

I've searched every Japanese online store that I can think of, and have talked to several people from the JJ site, and NO ONE has ever seen this album. You'd think that one copy would show up somewhere. God help us if it ever shows up on eBay. It would probably start out at $10,000 or so. :shock:


Capt. Bacardi
 
As far as "rating" this album goes, I have to say "I have Never Heard of this one..." :tongue:



Dave
 
The "All Music Guide to Jazz" gave STONEBONE five stars and called it the best of the A&M/CTI J&K series. I hope (as the book says) that "someone at A&M comes to their senses and rereleases it."

I've searched record shows, etc. for years and have never seen the Japanese LP.
JB
 
Just another reason why I don't believe everything that the AMG people say. I seriously doubt that this album was ever released anywhere. If it did you would think a copy would show up on eBay for over $1000 or something like that. There's no album image at all from anybody. When JJ was alive I got to exchange some e-mails with him, and he couldn't even recall the album, let alone whether it was ever released. Of course, with as much music as he made over the years I'm sure it would be difficult to remember everything.



Capt. Bacardi
 
Oh, it was a thrill doing this. He had a website through Yahoo that another trombonist had set up. He posted all the time, answered all kinds of questions, posted photos and told great stories about his past. He was also very candid when he found out he had prostrate cancer and for a while it had gone into remission. Obviously things went downhill after that and he had stopped posting, then we found out he had taken his own life. Very sad ending to one of the more influential jazz musicians of all time.



Capt. Bacardi
 
Fingers are crossed that someone is listening re: Stonebone. I left a note on the record label's site; we may need to do some "write-in" campaigns to draw some attention to it. (Provided they can locate the master tape, and UMe didn't let it get barbecued.)
 
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STONEBONE will apparently be available on Record Store Day and at Target, at least online:

Image posted over at SH.tv:

1583589653018.png
 
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And now the answer is "Yes". RSD '20 Special Release: J.J. Johnson and Kai Winding - Stonebone

It's going to be released for Record Store Day in April of 2020 and will be available at Target online at least:


1583590495875.png

Tracklist:

1. Don'tcha Hear Me Callin' To Ya? (13:57)
2. Musings (4:27)

3. Mojo (11:19)
4. Recollections (7:30)
 
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All I know is that it was only released briefly in Japan as an LP.
 
Oh, I'll be down for a copy or two! 👍👍 Long overdue.

I doubt there will be CD reissues, but I could forsee downloads in the future for both records. I know a couple of buddies going to RSD when I'm in Chicago--I might see if they can pick one or two up for me.
 
I don't know either. But this and the "lost" Tamba 4 album were right around the time Creed Taylor moved CTi out on its own. So maybe A&M shelved them? Or Taylor didn't give approval to release them? Maybe (for Tamba 4) Luiz Eça insisted on shelving their album since it strayed way too far from their Brazilian roots? We'll never know.

I do know that a couple of other releases were on shaky terms. Paul Desmond's Bridge Over Troubled Water I believe ended up on A&M (with no CTi imprint), yet it has all the CTi trimmings. Jobim's Tide and Stone Flower were both recorded at the same sessions, yet A&M/CTi got the leftovers, and Columbia/CTi got perhaps the best of the CTi albums with Stone Flower which is strong in every way that Tide is weak. (I'm hard pressed to choose between Wave and Stone Flower as the best of the three--they are that good.)

Come to think of it, one of George Benson's A&M/CTi albums was unissued until the early 80s when A&M did that AM+ reissues series of the CTi titles. (I Got A Woman and Some Blues.)
 
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I was poking around yesterday and read that the change from A&M to Columbia probably had a lot to do with why STONEBONE was never released in the US. The theory is that the four long songs, as they stood, weren't going to entice buyers to pick up the album. Too long-winded, and not radio-friendly.

Then the theory goes that as the sessions produced many more tracks than are represented currently, that the long ones were due to be edited to something less intimidating than they were, but with the change of CTi, it never happened.

Then the suppositions are that A&M sent the tracks over to Japan for release over there, perhaps for US servicemen stationed there, and that King Records hired out for English liner notes, again for the US servicemen - with the hopes that copies would be imported back to the US.

That's a lot of supposition, but there are probably some truths in there somewhere.
 
Rudy and Harry:

When Creed left A&M, it was to take CTi fully independent, with Motown providing distribution. That relationship soured in 1977, and bankruptcy and the association with Columbia happened in 1978. Ultimately, Columbia got the masters.

It's true that Quincy Jones and Paul Desmond carried on with A&M. I believe Desmond, Antonio Carlos Jobim and George Benson were the only A&M/CTi artists to have an album released on the stand-alone CTi (Jobim had both TIDE and STONE FLOWER about that time---the first went out on A&M, the second on CTi, Desmond went back to Creed for 1973's SKYLARK and Benson went straight over, with BEYOND THE BLUE HORIZON coming out in '71).

And, if you look at the releases on the new CTi, it's a lot of long cuts and four tracks per LP, so I don't think commercialism was the concern. In fact, until Deodato broke big, A&M/CTi was a much more commercial-leaning label than the standalone CTi.
 
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I think CTi had no problems with long and winding tracks, but A&M probably was looking for more hit-based albums. 1969 had been a tough year for the label.
 
Actually, I just had a thought:

The record business usually revolves around how many albums a label is owed.

Could A&M have refused to issue Tamba 4's CALIFORNIA SOUL, which was supposed to be SP 3021, George Benson's I GOT A WOMAN AND SOME BLUES, which was supposed to be SP 3025, the Hubert Laws LP that was supposed to be SP 3026 and STONEBONE, which was supposed to be SP 3027 as a strategic move to insure that A&M would get THE OTHER SIDE OF ABBEY ROAD, GULA MATARI, TIDE and Paul Desmond's BRIDGE OVER TROUBLED WATER---all of which had vastly more commercial potential?

In other words, if A&M had issued the four it held back, would CTi as a stand-alone have launched with Benson, Quincy, Jobim and Desmond?

The "real" A&M only released one--I GOT A WOMAN---and it was after CTi was no longer an entity. Now, UME is releasing two of the other three.
 
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....and...side question...will UME ever make CALIFORNIA SOUL and STONEBONE available for streaming now that they've gone to the trouble to make them commercially available on vinyl?
 
I would hope they end up as streaming/downloads at the very least. Although I know that with Kevin Gray's setup, he cuts master tapes to vinyl and that's it. I don't know if Cohearant has the ability to master to digital like Grundman's would. (I could find out.)

I somewhat wonder about the quality of the forthcoming Stonebone though. Tamba 4 released at a higher price point (~$10 more)on a different label (licensed through UMe). UMe's own new vinyl ends up being of very low quality--either the pressing is very low quality, or the mastering is poor. With Target claiming $15.99 on these, I don't see them being all that high in quality, unfortunately. But I hope to be pleasantly surprised. Maybe I'll have my SugarCube by then. 😉
 
It would also be interesting if a bonus track or two was somehow included. There were apparently other tracks recorded at the STONEBONE sessions.
 
It would also be interesting if a bonus track or two was somehow included. There were apparently other tracks recorded at the STONEBONE sessions.
Agreed. I think it would be more a matter of locating the original session tapes vs. the 2-track masters on which the album was compiled. That said, it would still be interesting to hear more tracks like those that ended up on Stonebone, if they are in a releasable format. (We wouldn't know if all the parts had yet been recorded, for instance.)
 
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