ROMANTIC WARRIOR

this album is essential fusion. With the stellar lineup consisiting of chick corea, lenny white, stanley clarke, and al dimeola, you can't go wrong! This album has it all; musicianship, creativity, an imaginitive theme, song length and progression, even really cool cover art. Lets go through song by song. Medieval overture is a perfect start for the album. Jazzy guitar and echoing keyboard draw you in. Soon you get some eriee, brooding double bass and keyboard passages. It is unreal, really. Sorceress is catchy, with some atmospheric keyboard, and cool guitar falls whcih remind me of shots of magic shooting from a sorceress' wand. Romantic warrior is a primarily acoustic piece with some surreal keyboard to open the piece. It progresses through some very magical moments of guitar and bass soloing with an oriental keyboard riff and an equally oriental guitar riff (which I emulate all the time because it's awesome!). Magestic dance is probably the most upbeat song here. It has a very driving bass line and very catchy guitar work. Also some very good keyboard/harpsichord passages. Some past passages too (lots of those in this album, di meola is here after all!) Next is my favourite, the magician. It starts off with a very mysterious vibe-like intro and a lightning fast unison passage which I still can't play (argh). This is the most diverse song on the album. It even teeters on the verge of metal for about 10 seconds, only to be followed by a very playfull keyboard riff, and of course...a slide whistle! yay! also, watch out for clarke's killer bass parts...they're very percussive. last, but in no way least is the duel of the jester and the tyrant. This song has an intro to rival the mysteriousness of that of the magician's. reminiscent of the 'brooding' passage in the medieval overture. the song is long and intense. This one contains the most furious of di meola's guitar work here. A huge blast of inspiration for myself as a guitarist. It really is a musical duel...di meola's guitar being the tyrant and corea's quirky keyboard part being the jester. This album has no real flaws...dare I say it is a masterpiece of fusion. No less than 5 stars for this one! Any lover of prog could easily use this album as a gateway into fusion. I did, and I never went back, back to what i'm not actually sure! this is top-of-the-line fusion, or even music in general. Anyone who appreciates complex, colorful, creative music should definitely have this one!!! I 'd give it 6 stars if I could because of it's importaince as a groundbreaking fusion album!