Seventeen Minutes Please

Is jazz a sound or a concept? (And when I say jazz for God's sakes I don't mean the sound. I don't really like the sound of jazz just yet.) Is it possible to be a jazz band in concept without people getting confused? Is the linguistics of things messing up what it's pointing towards?

If I said "we're a jazz band" can't I be allowed to mean that conceptually? The desire to improvise, not the desire to move my hands back and forth, aka 'jazz hands.' The desire for 17 minute songs, the desire to subvert expectations, whatever the tones created.

(For some people this may be such a elementary concept and conversation, but you know what, I'm tired of apologizing for having to play catch-up. In a quest to catch-up to everybody else you skip over the fundamentals, you skip over your foundations, you skip over playing the blues scales and then you have nothing. When you skip over the blues scales, you don't even have the blues scales in you repetoire. You have to go THROUGH something in order to get past it.)

So anyway, being way behind schedule aside, I want what I want. My eyes are being opened to what music is supposed to do here on the planet, and I would like to do my part to help that along. I understand it better, and now I'd like to execute it better...