OFFERING

4.5 stars really!!!

After the splendid Barefoot Boy, would Larry Coryell's troupes manage to follow it up as brilliantly with Offering?? Certainly LC didn't feel the need to change a winning team, so he also kept producer Weiss. With a semi-psych artwork, you'd guess this album would allow for looser themes, but actually, quite the opposite, this is a collection of much tighter tracks.

Sonically the album is fairly different (partly a production thing), and you "get" this right away in the album's longest track, Foreplay, which as the title indicates is only a warm up, with everyone getting a change to loosen up the fingers. Ruminations is somewhat more of a straighter jazz tune, but flirting constantly with dissonance, this is probably the album's hardest tune to play. The much easier Scotland I is more in the style of the previous BB or Nucleus-type of fusion.

The flipside starts on the drummer Wilkinson title track, a red-hot mid-tempo track taking the usual Bronson-Wilkinson Hendrix-trio, but with LC, Mandel and Markus up front, the mood is definitely fusion- esque and finishing up at 100 MPH. Great stuff. A rather solid change of pace with the ultra-slow Meditation track, which tends to bore the listener. The closing 8-mins Beggar's Chant is another pure beauty, a mid-tempo torrid blister on your speaker cones that will melt them down would the track last longer.

Although not quite as flawless as BB (which wasn't either due to a lengthy drum solo), Offering is an awesome album that every proghead should own.

I feel that the best album Larry released was "Barefoot Boy" and this particular album "Offering" was released the following year in 1972. Not nearly as good in my opinion but the joy for me with this recording is just listening to the impressive instrumental work. A five piece band of electric piano, guitar, drums, bass and soprano sax and I admit I'm not the biggest fan of soprano sax but this album certainly deserves the 4 stars I'm giving it. I found it interesting as well that Larry used two songs from Jazz keyboardist Doug Davis. Larry and the drummer composed the rest.

"Foreplay" opens with some distortion as a beat and keys kick in followed by sax. An uptempo Fusion track with the soprano sax playing over top until the guitar takes over around 3 minutes. It settles back around 6 minutes although it's still uptempo. The sax is back before 8 minutes to end it. "Ruminations" is led by sax and drums early but electric piano and bass help out here as well. Some nice drum work just before a minute as it turns quite jazzy, especially the piano and bass. The guitar arrives ripping it up as it trades off with the sax until they both light it up.

"Scotland I" opens with different sounds coming and going until around 1 1/2 minutes when outbursts start to come and go. An impressive instrumental display. It calms right down late. "Offering" has intricate drumming and guitar with electric piano and bass. I like this a lot. Coryell starts to light it up after a minute then it's the sax turn after 3 minutes. A great track.

"The Meditation Of November 8th" is the one track I can't get into. It's very relaxed with smooth sax, picked guitar and bass to start. It does pick up some before 2 minutes but I'm not into this one. "Beggar's Chant" features the sax playing over the electric piano, bass and drums. The guitar joins in as it builds. Check out the fuzz-wah electric piano! The guitar starts to solo after 4 minutes.

One Of Larry's better albums for sure, at least in his top five counting his work with ELEVENTH HOUSE.

Guitar god and "Godfather of Jazz-Rock Fusion" Larry Coryell's second foray into the studio with the same four musicians, including keyboard player Mike Mandel--the only member of this quintet that will be invited to become a part of the Eleventh House supergroup.

1. "Foreplay" (8:10) on this Coryell composition, Fender Rhodes player Mike Mandel provides a BRIAN AUGER-like support to Larry's musical machinations. Drummer Harry Wilkinson is quite adept at adding his own flourishes and nuances while bass player Mervin Bronson, like Mandel, sticks pretty close to the script. Saxophonist Steve Marcus is nowhere to be heard. Very nice play from all of the instrumentalists but the five chord rising progression gets a little exhausting after a while--(kind of like foreplay), but Man! can Larry Coryell move at some blistering speeds! (13.5/15)

2. "Ruminations" (4:17) Sax, guitar, and keys lead the way with rather complex arpeggio melody play of a four chord sequence on this Mike Mandel composition until the one minute mark when everything switches direction: moving down a smoother, more harmonically-horizontal chord sequence (at a rather breakneck pace) that sounds more oriented traditional jazz despite the active Herbie HANCOCK-like Fender Rhodes piano. Steve Marcus' soprano saxophone definitely does his best to match/keep up with Larry's incendiary electric guitar keys, usually going back and forth but often overlapping each other as if racing toward an end--and end that coincidentally arrives at 3:45 when the band switch back into a more modal style like the opening (though not quite the opening). The song then is given the engineer's fade to bring it to a close despite the musicians' continued play. This is definitely a song that helps illustrate why Larry Coryell is given so much credit for launching and test-driving the fusion of rock into jazz music. (9/10)

3. "Scotland I" (6:41) another ascending theme, this time from bass player Mervin Bronson, repeating the same six note climb over and over while saxophone, guitar, and drums go crazy all at the same time. The fifth minute is my favorite part when all of the melody instruments team up to spit out a supersonic melody line between each of Mervin's ascents. Despite the fullness of this soundscape, Larry and Steve continue firing impressive solo flourishes and runs over the cacophonous weave going on around them (obviously using second tracks for their additional sound contributions). All in all, this is a very mathematically-committed song that I'm not sure I really like--this despite the very impressive technical skills on display. Chris Squire's "Hold Out Your Hand" is quite reminiscent of this. (8.875/10)

4. "Offering" (6:46) a song that is credited to drummer Harry Wilkinson (despite my hopes that it would tie into the song of the same title from John Coltrane's final album, Expression, as it is a favorite of mine). The song is set up with a winning and infectious bass line that sounds quite a bit like Chicago's Peter Cetera's play on the band's 1969 debut album, Chicago Transit Authority. The bass is coupled with some very impressive Billy Cobham-like play from drummer Harry Wilkinson. From there the song resembles something like FOCUS' "Answers? Questions! Questions? Answers!" or "Anonymous Two" (from their 1973 release, Focus III) in the way that the guitar, saxophone, and keyboards all seem to launch into their own separate universes for long, continuous (and very impressive) soloing over the busy-yet-hypnotic play of the rhythm section. I don't know if it's the infectious rhythm section or the tasteful weave of multiple soloists all playing rather melodically at the same time, but I love this song. It's my favorite on this album. Definitely an example of a rock song played by rock musicians who are trying out their jazzy chops. From start to finish this song just feels like a treasure trove that is constantly revealing new things with each and every listen. (14.5/15)

5. "The Meditation of November 8th" (5:12) a spacious, contemplative song of reverb-treated soprano saxophone, electric guitar, electric bass, and metallic percussives all played with feeling and thoughtful emotion in a way that previews (or reflects) the works of Terje Rypdal, Jan Garbarek, and Pat Metheny. Very nice and sympathetic--not unlike some of the works of the early electric guitar masters of the 1960s. Perhaps this song is even intended as an homage to one such musician (someone who died on November 8th)? I've seen that some reviewers have called this song "boring" or "slow" and "hard to get into" but I find myself responding quite oppositely: I love the space that the band allows me--space to get inside and look at the sounds and notes and harmonies from multiple perspectives. I like this one very much. My second favorite song on the album. (9.33333/10)

6. "Beggar's Chant" (8:03) a bluesy foundation leads to some very bluesy playing from all of the instrumentalists. Man! These guys are so professional--and so proficient. There is quite a John Tropea/Jay Berliner-like DEODATO "Also Sprach Zarathustra" sound to Larry's guitar playing on this one (my least favorite sound and solo on the long 9-minute album version of the song). Definitely my least favorite song on the album and yet it's still damn good! (13.25/15)

Total Time 39:09

An album whose musicianship has little to no fault, whose intricately constructed and performed songs all rival anything that Herbie, Mahavishnu, or Chick Corea's Return To Forever ever put together, but, somehow, still feels as if could be better. Impressive keyboard player Mike Mandel seems at times to fade into the woodwork or wallpaper while guitarist Larry Coryell and soprano saxophonist Steve Marcus's explosive soloing styles (and sounds) have never been among my favorites, yet here, on Offering, I find myself deeply engaged and excited/willing to re-listen to each and every song multiple times: there's just this feeling that there is so much more to discover within the dense and complex weaves of each song. A big question I have is: Why are drummer Harry Wilkinson and bass player Mervin Bronson never mentioned in the conversations of great Jazz-Rock Fusion musicians?

A-/five stars; not only does this work out analytically as a masterpiece of Jazz-Rock Fusion, it feels like one! HIGHLY recommended--especially to any of you progsters that have never really gotten into Larry Coryell.