None of that Jazz

I plan to avoid the cantankerous rants favored by some of my peers, but if I were less heroic in my restraint, I might protest widely shared delusion of radio programmers that healthy, functioning fans of pop music, hip-hop, rock, or whatever, will want to listen to jazz on Sundays. This misapprehension is especially pernicious in the form of the "jazz brunch," both and figurative and literal. Here, the music is another layer of hollandaise, making those poached eggs a little easier to swallow. Some of my best friends listen to jazz all week long, but that is for another post. What you should be doing with your Sunday evenings, however, is listening to the R&B Jukebox on WMBR. Captain Al can tell you that he offers "the best vintage soul and R&B, with a touch of blues, and a smidgen of funk," but what he won't tell you is that he does it with humor and grace, and without the shtick of some old time R&B DJs, and without the cratedigging-as-trainspotting pedantry of some of the younger DJS. The Soul Spectrum, which comes on right after Captain Al, suffers from a bit of the latter tendency, but is still worth a listen. Also, if you are a transplanted Bostonian, eager to hear English as she is spoke in the home of the Red Sox and the Patriots, but without incessant self-congratulatory braying, or rage, Captain Al could have been the dialogue coach for Peter Falk. Tune in here. Tonight is the night for the pot au pho - pot au feu with pho seasonings. Earlier in the week, I had been complaining about an academic offering a pun in place of an argument in her lecture. but I like to think there is more to the pot au pho than that. The cinetrix is skeptical, but I am quietly confident.