SNAKEHIPS ETCETERA

Key exponents of classy jazz-rock, Ian Carr's Nucleus burst onto the British rock scene sometime during 1970 with the release of their dazzling debut album 'Elastic Rock'. Featuring Carr on trumpet, guitarist Chris Spedding and future Soft Machine leader Karl Jenkins, the music of Nucleus was both versatile and exciting stuff, the group capable of playing the most fiendishly-difficult blend of genre's, both on record and in the live arena. Despite a series of line-up shifts, between 1970 and 1975 Nucleus issued a series of excellent studio albums, with 'Elastic Rock' followed by 'We'll Talk About It Later' and 1971's 'Solar Plexus'. Featuring a multi-faceted hybrid of fusion styles and psychedelic sounds and textures, yet always underpinned by a strong jazz core, these first three records represented Nucleus at their most progressive and experimental, before 1973's 'Labyrinth' saw the onset of a slicker and funkier style. After 'Solar Plexus', an album billed under the heading of Ian Carr & Nucleus, the original line-up of Carr, Spedding, Jenkins, saxophonist/flautist Brian Smith, bassist Jeff Clyne and drummer John Marshall began to fragment, Spedding going solo and Jenkins joinng up with Soft Machine. By now the de-facto leader, Ian Carr would issue the group's next album, 1972's 'Bella-Donna', under his own name, before switching to yet another moniker - Nucleus with Ian Carr - for the following year's 'Labyrinth'. The group's fifth album overall, 'Labyrinth' opened up a new chapter in the Nucleus story, as Carr and company started playing a brand of jazz-rock influenced less by rock and more by funk. 'Roots'(1973) and 'Under The Sun'(1974) would continue the formula, before 1975's 'Snakehips Etcetera' saw Carr as the only original member left, the trumpeter now augmented by keyboardist Geoff Castle, saxophonist Bob Bertles, bassist Roger Sutton, guitarist Ken Shaw and drummer Roger Sellers. Featuring some truly striking artwork, 'Snakehips Etcetera' remains arguably the strongest of Nucleus' jazz-funk albums, yet it would also be the last Nucleus album of note in an impressive five-year run of releases. Many musicians would play on these albums, yet at the very core of the group was Ian Carr, a trumpeter and arranger of real skill. 'Snakehips Etcetera' may not have been the greatest of Nucleus albums, yet it proved the final piece in Carr's wonderful sonic puzzle of expertly-crafted jazz- rock. Alongside Soft Machine and If, Nucleus represent the very apex of British jazz-rock. STEFAN TURNER, STOKE NEWINGTON, 2013