Just as there are many ways to tell a musical story well, there are just as many ways to tell it badly. A grooving blues instrumental can be brilliant or lame, and so can a free jazz experiment. The difference... is that listeners feel more confident in dismissing a formulaic pop instrumental as a sell out than they do in snubbing an avant garde project filled with the apparent complexity of a million weird notes. If you play music in a mannered way... it’s going to suck whether you’re imitating John Coltrane or David Fathead Newman. It’s just easier to bullshit when you’re imitating Trane, because you can run all those notes and impress some people. What it really comes down to, though, is, are you committed to the moment? You hear it with Coltrane, he’s so fucking committed to each moment. And so is Fathead. Most music that doesn’t move people has an ulterior motive... People get together and make a game plan. They say, This is what’s hot, let’s make music like that, rather than sayi