
Even as a 12 year old I didn't know how to spell. "Wait a minute - Mix Tape Zero?" You're probably asking. Yeah. Mix Tape Zero. Let me explain. As I cleaned out the Volvo last week I came across an old cassette tape. It was the first "mix tape" I'd ever received. Compiled in 1994 by then-camp counselor Brian "Klugger" Klugman, this was our "bunk mix," the songs which myself, my bunkmates and our counselors had enjoyed throughout our 8-week summer camp experience. I went to camp every summer [...]

If you read my stuff with any regularity, you had to know this one was coming. After all, it was just last week that I generated a piece called Alan Jones - Father To The Son , and I even mentioned the possibility, so no surprise here. But that doesn't mean Jack's story is any less interesting than his father's - and in some ways, it's better. John Allan "Jack" Jones was born in Hollywood, a less than surprising beginning for the son of movie stars. (His mother was actress Irene Hervey.) Young Jack grew up in [...]

I had intended to write a piece about crooner Jack Jones, who has had - and continues to have - a long and successful career as a jazz and pop singer. But I decided to save that for another day, and instead tell the story of his talented dad, Allan Jones, who paved the way via his genes and his influence. The Pennsylvania-born Jones was the son of a coal miner, and spent some time underground himself as a young man but was able to sing his way into a scholarship that took him out of the [...]

Blood, Sweat & Tears: Spinning Wheel [ purchase ] Yet another Grammy-winning Jazz-influenced hybrid from NYC, this time from a band which fused pop, rock, blues and jazz instrumentation and style to form Jazz-Rock (which Wikipedia redirects as a synonym for Jazz Fusion , though I would argue that Jazz-Rock is much more pop- and blues oriented). I have fond memories of discovering this 1969 sophomore self-titled release just to the left of the folk in my father's record collection one evening in [...]