WIRED

Last saturday I played the L.P. version of this album after many years of not doing it. I was testing my late father`s old turntable in a lazy morning. After playing Jean-Luc Ponty`s "Fables" album (also the L.P.) I wanted to listen to more Jazz-Rock music, so I played "Wired" that day too. I also discovered that day that this turntable needs some adjustments (particularly in the "auto-stop" function), but after reading the "operator`s manual" I couldn`t fix these problems. So, I need to call somebody to do these fixes, because I couldn`t do it! Fortunately, I discovered that both records didn`t suffer damages when I played them in another turntable, but I have doubts about the other turntable, so I think it is better to not use it until a "specialist" fixes these problems!

It was a coincidence that today I discovered that Jeff Beck was added to the Prog Archives database. It was more a coincidence when this morning I was "playing in my mind" two songs of this album: "Blue Wind" and "Love is Green"! How I forgot to play again this L.P. for many years, being so good? The main reason was that I don`t have it on C.D., so my old L.P.s were forgotten for a long time, because I stopped listening to L.P.s when I bought my C.D. player. So, the L.P.s became "obsolete". One day I`m going to buy the C.D. of this album.

For this album, Jeff Beck recruited very good musicians who also contributed to the songwriting. In fact, none of the songs was composed by Beck. Drummer Narada Michael Walden composed four of the eight songs, keyboard player Max Middledton composed one song, Jan Hammer composed one song, bassist Wilbur Bascomb co- composed one song, and Jeff also selected Charles Mingus `"Goodbye Pork Pie Hat" song. It was a surpise for me that former The Beatles`producer George Martin produced this album (but Jan Hammer produced "Blue Wind" alone), because I didn`t know that Martin liked Jazz-Rock music.

This album is very good, energetic, played with "feeling" too.

"Led Boots": a song with very good drums by Walden, composed by Middleton, with guitar solos and a very good synth solo by Hammer. An energetic piece of music.

"Come Dancing": composed by Walden, played by himself and Ed Green on drums, Hammer playing "horn sounds" in his synth, and good guitars by Beck.

"Goodbye Pork Pie Hat": a Blues arrangement for this song, with Beck also playing several lead guitars.

"Head for Backstage Pass": co-composed by bassist Wilbur Bascomb, who is a very good bassist and in this song he plays very good Funky bass.

"Blue Wind": composed by Hammer, and only played by himself on drums and synth (the synth really playing the bass notes only) and Beck on several guitars. One of the heaviest musical pieces in this album. Hammer is also a good drummer.

"Sophie": a "Jazz-Rock ballad" (?) with very good drums by Walden, who also composed the song.

"Play with Me": another song composed by Walden with Funky rhythms too.

"Love is Green": until I listened to this album in 1982, the only song that I have listened to from Beck was called "Love is Blue" (in an EMI Capitol Mexico compilation album called "Las que Llegaron al Hit Parade", who curiously also includes The Beatles`"I Feel Fine" song played by the George Martin Orchestra!). Beck hated "Love is Blue" (which wasn`t composed by him and I think that despite having a ver commercial arrangement is not so bad) despite being a hit single for him in 1968! In contrast, "Love is Green" is a very good Jazz-Rock ballad, also composed by Walden, and played by himself on piano, with Beck on acoustic and electric guitars and bass by Bascomb. A very good song, in my opinion.

In conclusion, this is a very good album, with very good musicians. I don`t know why Walden, Hammer and Bascomb aren`t as famous as other very good musicians. They deserve it, in my opinion.