To me the most brilliant records are the ones where artists completely expose their soul".
From 1965 and 1968 come two such surprises: brilliant records of standards by the singer Helen Merrill and the pianist-arranger-producer Dick Katz.
An avid stoner who records brilliant records at warp speed, Kramer is prone to jumping onstage during a set whether or not he is invited.
He occasionally made brilliant records – not least 1995's impenetrable but rewarding Outside – but nothing matched what he'd achieved in the 70s.
But this is nonsense: Punk was flourishing in the late Seventies, and David Bowie was cranking out a string of brilliant records, and nobody needed four manipulative clowns from LA to take rock'n'roll in a daring new direction.
A little more than a decade later, Prince and Warner Bros. parted company — Prince had given the label another half-dozen blazingly brilliant records, after which the relationship between artist and label deteriorated into irreconcilable differences and bitter divorce.
