The Jazz-Rock/Fusion Appreciation Thread

Napoli Centrale hem? Gotta try to acquire those two, sounds interesting...

How about Napoli Centrale, guys?

Eleventh House w\Larry Coryell - as important to fusion as Mahavishnu Orchestra and RTF
Dreams - short lived but not forgotten (both Brecker brothers, Billy Cobham, John Abercrombie)
David Sancious - multi instrument fusion genius
IF - phenominal jazz\rock group (70s) from England
Brian Auger Oblivion Express - one of the best jazz organist ever
Frank Gambale - one of the best fusion guitarist going

In the last couple of months, I've been going over some of the Cryptogramophone release (the Cline bros., Bendian, Liebig, Stinson, Amendola, Maupin and many more) and have taken a liking to the varied output of this label. I also have been listening to some of Tim Berne's releases (under several names - Big Satan, Hard Cell etc.) which are different than the previous bunch, more experimenal, free form (though all of those use improvization to varying extent and under different pre-defnied frames).

Oh, and of course Gong definitely have to be mentioned too. Their jazz-rock period begins with the in my opinion slightly underrated "Shamal".

GILGAMESH..

LeInsomniac wrote: I'm mainly keen on Mahavishnu, AREA, Perigeo, Al di Meola, Bill Bruford, Return to Forever, Zappa and softmachine (in their Jazzy works)

With such preferences you're bound to love KENSO, especially their masterpiece FABULIS MIRABILIBUS, which you will find reviewed here:

http://www.progarchives.com/album.asp?id=6066

1800iareyay wrote: Their new album Quantum, is quite good, with Allan Holdsworth replacing MacAlpine. I think they sounded better with Tony, even though Holdsworth is the superior jazz guitarist.

Perhaps because our tastes differ slightly I have to say I prefer Quantum - coincidentally  it arrived yesterday from Amazon and has been played hard since. It is the first Planet X album I felt has consistent jazz rock fusion feel running throughout (of the 4 albums I have of their's), rather heavy instrumental rock with the occasional jazzy solo thrown in.  That perhaps reflects Sherinian and Donati's  employment of musicians who are better known for jazz rock than heavy rock. I've been an admirer of Australian Bret Garsed's guitarwork (various solo and duo albums with T.J Helmerich , including Uncle Moe's Space Ranch, although when adopts a Holdsworthian style in his solo work here, he does slightly confuse as to whether he or the maestro are playing certain passages - the liner notes are poor wrt who does what. Although I'm absolutely sure when Holdsworth is doing the business. And Jimmy Johnson, bass regular with Allan Holdsworth,  also helps give that feel of a near complete jazz rock album. Donati's drumming is pretty special on this album. Sherinian is comparatively restrained but when he strikes in there are echoes of Hammer and Emerson and dare I say it somethings I thought lifted from one of Jens Johansson's best solo album.

I recommend Quantum strongly - btw so are many of the contributors at Fusenet jazz rock discussion site, who turned me on to the album originally.

Early Embryo albums are great jazz rock too, especially "Bad Heads and Bad Cats" and their first live album.

For reference the thread below, which also dedicated to jazz rock, has been continued in this thread: