Providing no links to a bunch of losers

As the title suggests, I will be providing no links in this post, because I'm going to be complaining about a group that would benefit the jazz community, and probably the entire world, by just going away. They deserve no customers, and I shall not provide them any.

Sometime back, I wrote about the inefficiences of the Jazz Heritage Society. Their antiquated ordering scheme, their profligate fee structure, their amateurish letters and forms. At the time I wrote about them, however, I continued to be a member, because I felt they were still a decent option for obtaining good jazz music CD's at a reasonable cost, provided one worked within their limited and restrictive system.

Well, not anymore. You are not going to believe this story, but I assure you, it is true.

I recently went to the JHS web-site to decline the monthly offer (which you have to do if you are a member, unless you want the stuff shipped to you automatically), and I happened across their $3 and $4 CD offer. They had a couple of titles in there that I'd been wanting to buy cheap for some time, and a couple more that I was willing to buy if they were cheap, and still more that, though marginal, would be worth a couple bucks. Now, the thing you have to keep in mind is that they charge a shipping and handling fee PER SHIPMENT, plus handling charge PER CD. If you think of the per CD handling charge being included in the price, then all you have to do is order a decent quantity of CD's to amortize the per shipment fee down to a manageable amount, thereby saving you money on brand new jazz CD's.

So, I ordered 13 CD's, one a three CD set, and I was going to get them all for about $80, or just a little over $5 a CD.

NOT!

One week after placing my order, I received seven individual letters telling me that "Unfortunately, this item is unavailable and we are cancelling your order". That's right. They generated one letter for each CD they couldn't deliver. Well, that's $2.64 wasted right there, mailing seven letters instead of one. No wonder they have to charge so much above the cost of CD's to make ends meet. Dumbasses.

Then the next day (here it comes), a box arrived containing (guess how many...) a, as in one, CD and an itemized list. Amazingly, all of the CDs I received letters for were listed as "backordered" (not "cancelled"), and the remaining five undelivered CD's were listed as no longer available. Huh! So in the end, I ordered thirteen CDs, received only one, which I paid $4.98 for (because it was the only one that was not part of the $3-4 offer), and guess what? I paid $5.94 for shipping and processing for the $4.98 CD. Damn near $11 for one CD, that you can get for less than a third of that if you shop around on e-bay or Amazon.

I was beside myself with anger. Livid. I started to think of all the names I could call those idiots at JHS. But, I composed myself and wrote a terse, vaguely polite, extremely demanding email - containing no swear words - to the JHS demanding all of my money back and demanding that they pay return shipping. I told them I'm going to report them to the attorney general of the state of Alabama for their borderline fraudulent bait and switch tactic, as well as to the Consumer Protection Agency (which, in fact, I will do). I'm still waiting for a reply to my email as I write this.

Whatever you do, stay the hell away from the Jazz Heritage Society. They are little more than a poorly operated, not so thinly disguised scam operation, and you can do better elsewhere to add to your music collection without also having to deal with their poorman's form of extortion. They are a bunch of simple-minded dumbasses, and you'll be no better a dumbass than I if you do business with them.

A bit of a rant

I wrote recently about joining the Jazz Heritage Society in order to plug some holes in my music collection as cheaply as possible. I succeeded nicely in picking up some classics such as Dave Brubeck's Time Out and Miles Davis' Milestones, plus a number of others, generally for around $5 a pop, which I consider reasonable. I have been finding, however, that these pre-internet organizations, especially the ones that have not kept up with the technology and have not established a worthwhile internet presence, really are hard to do business with. Some of them, like the BMG music club, have even had to go out of business. I think the JHS may be close to having to do the same very shortly. Here's why I think that.

First of all, the "printed" materials that came with my introductory shipment were right out of the stone age. You could almost smell the mimeograph solution on the letters. I hadn't seen anything as quaint since seventh grade. The "catalog" they sent was printed on rough, cheap newsprint. It was in color, after a fashion, but looks not unlike those "colorized" black and white movies.

Now, let's be clear: I joined the JHS just to get music cheap. And, I have succeeded in that, so far. But the other shortcomings I'm about to outline are, I think, inexcusable for an organization calling itself a "Heritage Society". First, going back to the internet discussion, I'm inundated, almost daily but easily twice weekly, with "Featured Selections" that I am required to respond to. Some selections that I have declined (in fact, I've declined every one so far), have even returned as featured selections again. Like my mom used to tell us kids when we were growing up, "No means no". I don't understand why the JHS doesn't get something as simple as that and can't make their website operate properly.

Next is the music. Take last week's shipment for example: Miles Davis' Complete In a Silent Way Sessions, and a 10-CD set of Chet Baker. The Miles set was just like the regularly available commercial set, chock full of pictures, information, liner notes, etc. The Chet Baker set, on the other hand, contained NO information about the recordings. None. Zilch. Zippo. Okay, sure, I got ten hours of music for about three bucks a CD, and these were also my first Chet Baker (and Gerry Mulligan) recordings, but, come on! Is it really asking too much to at least have a listing of the musicians playing on each recording? Maybe a blurb about when some of the bigger hits were recorded. I mean, really, isn't this a Jazz Heritage Society recording? What about the "heritage" part. That includes understanding the heritage of the recording, right? Just buying and listening to the music doesn't promote the heritage of jazz, or anything else for that matter.

It is going to be really, really hard to learn anything about the 200+ songs on that 10-CD set. I'm going to have to try, anyway.

My advice to readers is, go ahead and join the JHS for the cheap music, just be prepared to send lots of e-mails and fill in the blanks in your jazz education yourself.

Milestones

Tomorrow marks the one year anniversary of this blog, but with work and school, I decided to go ahead and commemorate the event a day early with this entry.

All I can say is, the blog has made me zero dollars, but I am still having fun doing it and I've had a lot of comments, both on and off the blog, from friends, family and new acquaintances who enjoy it. I truly think it has helped my music because I get the chance to sit and think about what I've been listening to, or what I've been playing, or what I've been learning, so it serves as reinforcement of what is going on in my head and heart musically. It's all good.

Speaking of Milestones, I just picked up that wonderful CD from the Jazz Heritage Society. The recording is really good and if you are into jazz piano, it is worth it just for Red Garland playing on Billy Boy. Gosh, that song is great and Garland's block chords are the bees knees, man, I'm telling ya!

So, congratulations to me for one year of Late to Jazz. Toast me when y'all think about it.

Coming soon:
-Yoity Tot List updates and changes
-My preliminary experience with Finale notation software and learning to arrange music
-Practicing hard during spring break

Stop back soon!

I'm helping the economy, a little. You?

Back in August, I bought a new car that included an XM Radio introductory package. After the free 90 days was up, I had the opportunity to sign up for another three months for $6.99 per month, which I did, and after that, the price was to go up to $12.99 per month. Right before the price was due to go up, I decided I would cancel the membership anyway. My logic was simple: I'm only in my car for 40 minutes a day five days a week, mostly, and it isn't worth $13 a month to listen to a handful of songs a day, especially with my burgeoning jazz music collection to keep me company on drive time. Naturally, I used this fact as a catalyst to start buying some more CD's for my collection. Then I called XM to cancel.

As soon as I told them it wasn't worth the high price to renew, they offered me five more months for $3.99 a month. Now, I sort of figured they would offer me something, and I thought that they would likely give me another three months for $7 a month. With this much improved offer, I was hard pressed to say no, and in fact, said "OK".

But I didn't stop my CD buying.

In addition to discovering the Jazz Heritage Society, I also started scouring e-bay for things on my music want list. This is a lot harder than it sounds, because my first search of e-bay for "jazz cd" turned up 140,000 matches! Still I was able to pare it down, and between my five introductory CD's from JHS and my purchases on e-bay, which average around $4 each, including shipping (!), I picked up the following:

Cross Country Tour by Ahmad Jamal
The New Crystal Silence by Chick Corea and Gary Burton (signed)
Milestones by Miles Davis
Focus by Stan Getz
The Complete Last Concert by the Modern Jazz Quartet
Head Hunters by Herbie Hancock
Concert by the Sea by Erroll Garner
some Stan Kenton
some Kathy Kosins
Bingo by Rova
Blue Train by John Coltrane

Ahmad Jamal and MJQ both will be on the Yoity Tot list, just as soon as I figure out who to shunt out of the list in their favor. (Don't worry. I plan to start a "Formerly on the Yoity Tot List list".) Most of the other stuff I haven't even had a chance to listen to yet, since I'm still listening to XM in the car and practicing playing music almost all the time when I'm at home. Anyway, the point is that e-bay can be a valuable resource for purchasing music on the cheap, as can the JHS (which has the advantage that everything you purchase is new), and that when I find new resources, I like to use them.

As always, I continue to do my meager part to get the economy rolling again. I say, Let's Jazz America!