Eumir Deodato - 1973 [2000] "Deodato 2"

Deodato 2 is a 1973 album by Brazilian keyboardist Eumir Deodato. It features noted session guitarist John Tropea on 4 tracks and virtuoso bassist Stanley Clarke on one song, "Skyscrapers". His version of George Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue" was used in Pontiac commercials during the early-1970s. The song reached #48 in Canada in 1973.

The surprise success of “Also Sprach Zarathrustra” on Prelude prompted Deodato to quickly follow with Deodato 2, a record that closely followed the template of his first number one hit. Deodato knew there was a lot of money to be made courting the rock audience, and there’s little on this record that could safely be called jazz. However, this record still stands up remarkably well today, unlike some of the other keyboard-driven records from the era. This time “Rhapsody in Blue” and “Death of A Pavane Princess” get the revisionist treatment and they provide a nice contrast to one another; the former is all funky electric piano and fierce rock and roll guitar, the later a minimalist piece with synthesized strings and icy piano flourishes. However, the real gems are the Deodato originals; disco-ish workouts like “Funky Strut” and “Skyscrapers” probably appealed to Stevie Wonder and Earth, Wind, and Fire fans originally and will find favor with the club scene today. Three bonus cuts are added to the original running time, including a lovely tune called “Venus” and a passable run through of Steely Dan’s “Do It Again”. Although Prelude is still the better of the two, Deodato 2 isn’t far behind.

Deodato's debut for CTI, Prelude, earned him a genuine reputation for funky fusion with its groove-tight cover of "Thus Spake Zarathustra," the theme from Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey. The rest of the album isn't quite as memorable, but it fit the bill and got nice reviews for its innovative read of Borodin and Debussy's "Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun." On 2, the Brazilian composer and arranger dips into the funked-up fusion tank once again, and comes out with a more consistent disc than its predecessor. Arranged, conducted, and keyboarded by Deodato himself instead of CTI house arrangers Don Sebesky or Bob James, the maestro enlisted a fusion who's who of sidemen including drummer Billy Cobham, bassist Stanley Clarke, and flutist Hubert Laws, as well as rockers like John Tropea on guitar. The larger ensemble that provides brass, woodwind, and string support includes trumpeter Jon Faddis and Jim Buffington. "Super Strut" kicks it off. Deep-grooved lines of accented angular riffing and rim-shot syncopation by Cobham turn this simply notated four-stepper into a burning ball of greasy rock and souled-out jazz. This is followed by a wildly campy but nonetheless wondrous read of "Rhapsody in Blue" done Stevie Wonder-style. Deodato's keyboard work never lets the groove drop; he pulls the rhythm section down around him and hunkers his phrasing to punch up the long, sweeping horns and string lines. Less successful is a read of "Nights in White Satin," with its overwrought strings, and a "Pavane for a Dead Princess" that's a snore. The album officially closes with "Skyscrapers," another jazz-rock rave-up that blasts holes in the sonic sky with its dueling keyboard and guitar lines.

Track listing: 

The CD release also featured an extended version of Super Strut, an extended and re-mixed outro to Skyscrapers, as well as 3 bonus tracks.

1.    "Super Strut" - 9:31
2.    "Rhapsody in Blue" - 8:48
3.    "Nights in White Satin" - 6:01
4.    "Pavane for a Dead Princess" - 4:08
5.    "Skyscrapers" - 7:01

Bonus tracks

6.    "Latin Flute" (Eumir Deodato) - 4:49
7.    "Venus" (Eumir Deodato) - 3:32
8.    "Do It Again" (Walter Becker, Donald Fagen) - 5:31

Personnel:

Band

    Eumir Deodato: Keyboards, Acoustic and Electric Piano
    John Tropea: Guitars
    John Giulino, Stanley Clarke: Bass
    Alvin Brehm, Russell Savakus: Arco Bass
    Billy Cobham, Rick Marotta, Frank Zee: Drums
    Gilmore Degap, Rubens Bassini: Congas, Percussion

Strings

    David Nadien, Elliot Rosoff, Emanuel Green, Gene Orloff, Harold Kohon, Harry Cykman, Harry Glickman, Harry Lookofsky, Irving Spice, Joe Malin, Max Ellen, Paul Gershman: Violin
    Alfred Brown, Emanuel Vardi: Viola
    Alan Shulman, Charles McCracken, George Ricci: Cello

Woodwinds

    Joe Temperley: Baritone Sax
    George Marge, Hubert Laws, Jerry Dodgion, Romeo Penque: Flute
    Tony Studd: Bass Trombone
    Garnett Brown, Wayne Andre: Trombone
    Brooks Tillotson, Jim Buffington: French Horn
    Alan Rubin, Marvin Stamm, Jon Faddis: Flugelhorn and Trumpet
    Burt Collins, Joe Shepley, Victor Paz: Trumpet

Blood, Sweat & Tears - 1972 [1999] "Greatest Hits"

Greatest Hits is a compilation album by the band Blood, Sweat & Tears, initially released in February 1972.

The best selling title in the Blood, Sweat & Tears catalog (SoundScans 1,000 units per week) is now available digitally remastered - the way it was meant to sound! This release restores the album to it's original form - all the hits (4 cuts have been restored to the single versions that appeared on the original Greatest Hits LP), plus 2 bonus tracks: "So Long Dixie" and "More And More." Highlights include "You've Made Me So Very Happy," "Spinning Wheel," "And When I Die" and more.

Although Blood, Sweat & Tears continued to record and tour for several more years, the band's lineup changed dramatically after Blood, Sweat & Tears 4. This compilation album includes all of the group's best-known material up to that time. This was the group's last album to earn a Gold Record award.

Columbia initially chose to incorporate the edited single versions of many of the songs, a decision which was poorly received by some fans. Some later Compact Disc releases replaced the single versions with the full length album versions.

In 1999 the album was remastered and re-released on CD with two bonus tracks - "So Long Dixie" and "More And More". In 2016, Audio Fidelity released a Super Audio CD version with the single versions as in the original release. This was a numbered limited edition mastered by Steve Hoffman and Stephen Marsh.

Sometimes, a greatest-hits set is timed perfectly to gather together a group's most successful and familiar performances just at the point when that group has passed the point of their maximum exposure to the public, but before the public memory has had a chance to fade. That was the case when Columbia Records assembled this compilation for release in early 1972. At that point, Blood, Sweat & Tears had released four albums and scored six Top 40 hits, each of which is heard here. But lead singer David Clayton-Thomas had just quit the group, so that the unit that recorded songs like "You've Made Me So Very Happy" was not working together anymore. And even when Clayton-Thomas returned, the band would continue to decline commercially.

As such, BS&T's Greatest Hits captures the band's peak in 11 selections--seven singles chart entries, plus two album tracks from the celebrated debut album when Al Kooper helmed the group, and two more from the Grammy-winning multi-platinum second album.
Using the short singles edits of songs like "And When I Die" emphasizes their radio-ready punch over the more extended suitelike arrangements on the albums, but this selection gains in focus what it lacks in ambition. For the millions who learned to love BS&T in 1969 when they were all over AM radio, this is the ideal selection of their most accessible material. (A later CD reissue of Blood, Sweat & Tears' Greatest Hits replaced each singles edit with the original full-length version.)

Track Listing:

01     You've Made Me So Very Happy
02     I Can't Quit Her
03     Go Down Gamblin'
04     Hi-De-Ho That Old Sweet Roll
05     Sometimes In Winter
06     And When I Die
07     Spinning Wheel
08     Lisa, Listen to Me
09     I Love You More Than You'll Ever Know
10     Lucretia Mac Evil
11     God Bless the Child
12     So Long Dixie
13     More and More

Personnel:

    David Clayton-Thomas - lead vocals except as noted, guitar on "Go Down Gamblin'"
    Steve Katz - electric guitar, acoustic guitar, harmonica, mandolin, vocals, lead vocals on "Sometimes In Winter"
    Jim Fielder - bass guitar
    Al Kooper - Piano, Organ, lead vocals on "I Can't Quit Her" and " I Love You More Than You'll Ever Know"
    Dick Halligan - organ, piano, electric piano, harpsichord, celeste, trombone, flute, alto flute, baritone horn, vocals
    Fred Lipsius - piano, organ, alto saxophone, clarinet, vocals
    Lew Soloff - trumpet, flugelhorn, piccolo trumpet
    Jerry Weiss - trumpet, flugelhorn, vocals
    Chuck Winfield - trumpet, flugelhorn
    Randy Brecker - trumpet, flugelhorn
    Dave Bargeron - trombone, tuba, bass trombone, baritone horn, acoustic bass
    Jerry Hyman - trombone, bass trombone, recorder
    Bobby Colomby - drums, percussion, vocals

Stanley Clarke - 1976 [1999] "School Days"

School Days is a solo album by jazz fusion bassist Stanley Clarke, released in 1976. The album reached number 34 on the Billboard 200 chart and number 2 on the Jazz Albums chart.

Every pro electric-bass player and their mothers wore out the grooves of this record when it first came out, trying to cop Clarke's speedy, thundering, slapped-thumb bass licks. Yet ultimately, it was Clarke's rapidly developing compositional skills that made this album so listenable and so much fun for the rest of us, then and now.

The title track not only contributed a killer riff to the bass vocabulary; it is a cunningly organized piece of music with a well-defined structure. Moreover, Clarke follows his calling card with two tunes that are even more memorable -- the sauntering ballad "Quiet Afternoon" and an ebullient, Brazilian percussion-laced number with a good string arrangement and a terrific groove, "The Dancer." Clarke also brings out the standup bass for a soulful acoustic dialogue with John McLaughlin on "Desert Song."

Evidently enthused by their leader's material, David Sancious (keyboards) and Raymond Gomez (guitars) deliver some of their best solos on records -- and with George Duke on hand on one cut, you hear some preliminary flickerings of Clarke's ventures into the commercial sphere. But at this point in time, Clarke was triumphantly proving that it was possible to be both good and commercial at the same time.

Stanley Clarke went from whiz kid to wizard in five short years. On School Days, he steps out of the shadow of Return To Forever to show us what he’s learned. Suffice to say that fusion fans took note(s). School Days is set up to showcase the many sides of Stanley: fusion, funk, smooth, classical, acoustic, R&B. For progressive fusion fans (i.e., the kind of people who only get jazzed about RTF, Frank Zappa, Brand X, etc.), School Days scores an A+ on the merit of the opening title track alone.

“School Days” is basically six feet of genius crammed into eight minutes of music. I walked away from that song thinking that Clarke had found a way to match the best progressive fusion artists of the day and make it look easy. “Quiet Afternoon” explores the romantic/smooth jazz side of Stanley Clarke, though it’s not as painful as you’d think. “The Dance” follows exotic fusion, “Desert Song” journeys into the arid world of acoustic jazz , “Hot Fun” is a crazy funk song that lives up to its name, and “Life Is Just A Game” brings out all the stops in a big fusion finale, including vocals.

Earlier albums showcased many of the same skills, but were partly weighed down by extended suites and occasionally weak arrangements. School Days is different, as Stanley Clarke scores extra credit with one great number after another. Is it his best record? Well, given what I’ve heard so far, that would be an educated guess.

Track listing:

1. School Days (7:50)
2. Quiet Afternoon (5:05)
3. The Dance (5:23)
4. Desert Song (6:53)
5. Hot Fun (2:50)
6. Life Is Just A Game (9:00)

Personnel:

    Stanley Clarke – electric bass guitar (1, 3, 5, 6), vocals (1, 6), handbells (1), acoustic piano (2, 3), piccolo bass guitar (2, 3, 6), humming (3), acoustic bass (4, 6), gong (6), chimes (6), arranger, conductor, producer
    George Duke – keyboards (6)
    Ray Gomez – electric guitar (1, 3, 5), rhythm guitar (3)
    Icarus Johnson – acoustic guitar (6), electric guitar (6)
    John McLaughlin – acoustic guitar (4)
    David Sancious – keyboards (1), Minimoog (2, 3), organ (3), electric guitar (5)
    Gerry Brown – drums (1, 3), handbells (1)
    Billy Cobham – drums (6), Moog 1500 (6)
    Steve Gadd – drums (2, 5)
    Milt Holland – percussion (3), conga (4), triangle (4)
    Tom Malone, Dave Taylor – trombone
    Jon Faddis, Alan Rubin, Lew Soloff – trumpet
    Earl Chapin, John Clark, Peter Gordon, Wilmer Wise – horns
    Al Aarons, Stewart Blumberg, George Bohanon, Buddy Childers, Robert Findley, Gary Grant, Lew McCreary, Jack Nimitz, William Peterson, Dalton Smith - brass
    Marilyn Baker, Thomas Buffum, David Campbell, Rollice Dale, Robert Dubow, Janice Gower, Karen Jones, Dennis Karmazyn, Gordon Marron, Lya Stern, Ron Strauss, Marcia Van Dyke, John Wittenberg – strings

Trio Beyond - 2006 "Saudades"

Saudades is the name of the debut double-disc album released by Trio Beyond in 2006 on ECM records. Saudades is a Portuguese word meaning sadness or longing for times past, or in a musical context, blues.

The AllMusic review by Thom Jurek awarded the album 4½ stars, stating, "Jack DeJohnette initiated a project to pay tribute to the late Tony Williams' Lifetime... The results on this double-disc album, Saudades, are explosive, dynamic, and utterly compelling... This is one of the finer moments in recent ECM history, and a fitting tribute to Williams and his contribution to a music that sharply divided "purists' (who still are a pain in the ass in trying to preserve jazz as a museum piece), and those more progressive thinking fans who were -- and are still -- looking for a music that could breathe, engage the culture, and continue to grow". A JazzTimes reviewer selected it in 2012 as one of DeJohnette's key albums, and wrote that it "might be his most incendiary showcase of sheer drumming prowess".

Looking back has become almost de rigeur lately, and with that the risk of putting legacy groups on a pedestal—being fervently imitative, rather than taking the music to new places. Saudades pays tribute to the late drummer Tony Williams' groundbreaking fusion group Lifetime, and Trio Beyond clearly has the right idea. The spirit and energy which defined Lifetime's brief existence is in full force on this live double-disc set, but Trio Beyond's ability to apply a modernistic bent to Lifetime's raw power makes Saudades more than just a heartfelt tribute. It's one of the best releases of 2006.

Drummer Jack DeJohnette, guitarist John Scofield and keyboardist Larry Goldings ensure that Williams' revolutionary work is given a facelift that's reverent but speaks with its own voice. Culling material from Lifetime's Emergency! (Polydor, 1969) and Turn It Over (Polydor, 1970), and dipping into the repertoire of Lifetime organist Larry Young and iconic bandleader Miles Davis—who first brought Williams to prominence—Trio Beyond's purview is broader than Lifetime's ever was.

DeJohnette and Williams were contemporaries, so there's no denying that cross-pollination occurred. Williams swung hard, and here DeJohnette is as raucous as he's ever sounded, approaching John Coltrane's "Big Nick with a muscularity rarely heard from him these days. Always a malleable player, DeJohnette keeps the time profoundly elusive yet undeniably clear on the ballad "I Fall in Love Too Easily.

A decade his junior, Scofield couldn't help but be influenced by Lifetime guitarist John McLaughlin's seemingly unschooled but, in reality, highly studied approach to aggressive jazz guitar. Scofield has rarely played with this level of energy and angularity, especially when the trio's take on McLaughlin's knotty "Spectrum breaks down mid-stream. With his own harmonic approach, Scofield applies a host of electronic processing to take his instrument to places McLaughlin simply couldn't have visited.

At 38, Larry Goldings is the same age as Young was when he died tragically in 1978. Young's more abstract modality figures more in Goldings' approach than the soul jazz of Jimmy Smith or Jack McDuff.

Reaching Lifetime's sonic levels on "Emergency and "Spectrum, Trio Beyond also shines in its reinvention of material Williams played during his tenure with Miles. "Seven Steps to Heaven opens with a powerful vamp that sets up the familiar theme, played with unexpectedly staggered time and an energy that leads into Scofield's hard-hitting solo, supported by an unrepentant DeJohnette and Goldings' in-the-stratosphere accompaniment.

While Trio Beyond demonstrates more finesse than Lifetime, it would be a mistake to consider this a more conventional group. There's nothing polite about it, and Saudades demonstrates that when you bring together three players with a common goal, the resultant chemistry can make for music that's both visceral and cerebral. With a European tour this year and dates lining up for 2007, it looks like Trio Beyond will be around for awhile—which is good news for those who want to hear three players at the absolute top of their game.

Track listing:

Disc One:

    "If" (Joe Henderson) - 10:07
    "As One" (Larry Goldings) - 4:36
    "Allah Be Praised" (Larry Young) - 0:43
    "Saudades" (Jack DeJohnette, John Scofield, Larry Goldings) - 10:46
    "Pee Wee" (Tony Williams) - 12:13
    "Spectrum" (John McLaughlin) - 16:11

Disc Two:

    "Seven Steps To Heaven" (Miles Davis, Victor Feldman) - 12:54
    "I Fall in Love Too Easily" (Jule Styne, Sammy Cahn) - 10:13
    "Love In Blues" (DeJohnette, Goldings, Scofield) - 4:45
    "Big Nick" (John Coltrane) - 17:08
    "Emergency" (Williams) - 11:19

Personnel:

Jack DeJohnette: drums;
John Scofield: guitars;
Larry Goldings: Hammond organ, electric piano, sampler.