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Larry Jaffee

Larry Jaffee

Larry Jaffee is a freelance writer living in New York. His writing, much of which has been music-related, has appeared in The New York Times, Rolling Stone, Vibe, Record Collector, The Word, The Audiophile Voice, Billboard, Tower Records’ Pulse, Popular Music & Society, BMI Music World, The Wiz Beats, The Beat, Good Times, amNY, Mother Jones, Hollywood Reporter, High Times, and High Fidelity, among other publications. From 1998-2005, he was a contributing editor to the Bob Dylan fanzine On The Tracks, for which he interviewed the likes of Kris Kristofferson, Roger McGuinn. Loudon Wainwright III, Ian Hunter, Billy Bragg, Carolyn Hester, Jacques Levy, Kinky Friedman, D.A. Pennebaker, Nora Guthrie, among numerous other Dylan associates.

Jaffee edited a CD/DVD production trade magazine called Medialine from 1998-2005, and has continued to write about the packaged media industry for MediaPack, One to One, Digital2Disc and Package Design magazine. In 2003 Jaffee launched the Alex Awards for Packaging Excellence, which ran from 2003-2006, in honour of Alex Steinweiss, who created Columbia Records’ first album cover in 1940. He also wrote the liner notes to the surround/Monster Music release of George Benson/Al Jarreau’s Grammy-winning album Givin' It Up.
As a consultant, he hasbeen on retainer to music attorney H. William Krasilovsky. For nearly 20 years, Jaffee has also edited and published the Walford Gazette, the world’s only quarterly newspaper dedicated to EastEnders (www.wgazette.com), with permission from the BBC. This entrepreneurial venture has resulted in two recently published books Walford State of Mind and Albert Square & Me: The Actors of EastEnders.
lsjaffee@gmail.com

List of articles in the library by artist

Gregg Allman: Low Country Blues

Review by Larry Jaffee, Audiophile Review, Fall 2011

BEFORE YOU EVEN HEAR a note, the coupling of Gregg Allman produced by T-Bone Burnett seems like a match made in heaven. ...

Billy Bragg (1990)

Interview by Larry Jaffee, Rock's Backpages Audio, May 1990

The Bard of Barking talks about being politicised, the Miners' Strike, experiences of racism in the Army, his The Internationale album, and really rather a lot about Margaret Thatcher!

File format: mp3; file size: 30.1mb, interview length: 32' 54" sound quality: ****

AUDIO: J.J. Cale (1990)

Interview by Larry Jaffee, Rock's Backpages Audio, March 1990

Tulsa's finest talks about recording, songwriting, Leon Russell, Paul Simon and Spooner Oldham, Silvertone Records, 'After Midnight' and much more.

File format: mp3; file size: 52.5mb, interview length: 59' 03" sound quality: ***

Ray Davies: Supper Club, NYC

Live Review by Larry Jaffee, Record Collector, February 2006

RAY DAVIES, the leader of the Kinks, is back in circulation after an extended layoff, due to getting shot in New Orleans while trying to ...

Bob Dylan: Bobfest: Bringing It All Back To Dylan

Retrospective by Larry Jaffee, High Times, February 1993

He's a pop-culture icon who gave the 1960s counterculture an attitude, a look and a song, 'The Times They Are A-Changin'', that became the anthem ...

John Mellencamp: Life, Death, Love & Freedom

Review by Larry Jaffee, Audiophile Review, June 2009

JOHN MELLENCAMP is one of these artists who has always confounded me. ...

Ramones, The: Joey Ramone (1985)

Interview by Larry Jaffee, Rock's Backpages Audio, 1985

Da Brudda gives us his Desert Island Discs and raps about record labels, producers and the musically and politically sterile 1980s.

File format: mp3; file size: 52.2mb, interview length: 57' 02" sound quality: ***

AUDIO: Lou Reed (2003)

Interview by Larry Jaffee, Rock's Backpages Audio, February 2003

On The Raven, the ups and, mostly, downs of CDs, mp3s and (re)mastering and more.

File format: mp3; file size: 24.9mb, interview length: 27' 11" sound quality: ***

Robyn Hitchcock: He Often Dreams of Packaging

Report and Interview by Larry Jaffee, MediaPack, December 2009

LIKE MANY singer-songwriters, Robyn Hitchcock needs to supplement his boundless creativity with art forms in addition to music. Not surprisingly, when he's not releasing albums ...

Gil Scott-Heron (1986)

Interview by Larry Jaffee, Rock's Backpages Audio, August 1986

Scott-Heron talks about music and politics, Reron and B Movie, Sun City, Clive Davis and Arista/RCA, and ruminates on favourites old and new.

File format: mp3; file size: 18.1mb, interview length: 19' 42" sound quality: * (phoner)

Sid Vicious on Trial

Report by Larry Jaffee, Imagine, January 1979

SID VICIOUS, bass player for the now-defunct, notorious punk rock band, the Sex Pistols, pleaded not guilty on November 21; at his arraignment to the ...

Al Stewart: A Reticent Recording Artist

Profile and Interview by Larry Jaffee, Record Collector, February 2006

AL STEWART’S four-decade career recently was capsulated by a 5-CD boxed set Just Yesterday from EMI. His first four UK albums on CBS never were ...

Richard Thompson, Teddy Thompson, Richard and Linda Thompson: The Family Business: Richard Thompson and Relatives

Retrospective and Interview by Larry Jaffee, Audiophile Review, April 2010

Sept. 2011 note: I spent 18 months working on this piece. Richard was the easiest to get hold of. When I shared this tidbit with ...

Neil Young: Sugar Mountain - Live At Canterbury House

Review by Larry Jaffee, Audiophile Review, December 2009

NEIL YOUNG HAS BEEN such a music staple in our collective consciousness for so long that it’s nearly impossible to remember that he was once ...

List of genre pieces

Masterclass: Phil Ramone

Interview by Larry Jaffee, The Audiophile Voice, 2002

PHIL RAMONE is a legendary music producer who's been at the helm on recordings by a who's who of 20th century popular music, the likes ...

Tom Silverman: No Expense Spared

Interview by Larry Jaffee, MediaPack, May 2006

Tom Silverman, the pioneer rap music label owner of New York-based Tommy Boy Records, is unusual among his label head peers. He's willing to spend ...

K-Tel's Place in the Music Industry: Where Have All the One-Hit Wonders Gone?

Retrospective by Larry Jaffee, Popular Music and Society, 1986

COMEDIAN ROBERT KLEIN has a story about how you can call up K-tel and order every record ever made. A forty-foot trailer will drive up ...

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