RETURN TO THE EMERALD BEYOND

A nice tribute to my personal favorite fusion-jazz album, Mahavishnu Orchestra's "Vision of the Emerald Beyond, this rednition takes the essence of the original recording (plus a track or two from ...Orchestra's "Apocolypse") and strrrrrretches the songs out to swaying, funky, rockin, and trippy heights. Don't look for the guitar solos to burn the fretboard the way John McLaughlin did them (hell, almost NOBODY can do it like John did), but this guy playing guitar is more than passable.

The gas about this tribute recording is that it's performed LIVE!! And what a killer recording! You don't even know it's live until the end of track 2 ("Lila's Dance" - my favorite cut from the original). There is some great Hammond organ playing where the keys were more "mixed back" on the original.

I highly recommend this (and the original as well) for anyone who likes progressive rock, classical and jazz music forms, as the connection to fusion jazz here and with MO is verrrry close.