NUCLEUS

With 'Elastic Rock' (1970) and 'We'll Talk About It Later' (1971) the jazz-rock / fusion group Nucleus set the highest standard for seventies instrumental jazz rock. This outfit led by Ian Carr was heavily influenced by Miles Davis' transition from bebop to fusion as pioneered on the album 'In a Silent Way'. The band has some funk and rock influences as well. 'Solar Plexus' was also released in 1971, but it wasn't initially planned to be a Nucleus record - all tracks are written by Carr here. The production sound is still quite good, but don't expect that glorious sound of the before mentioned albums. The compositions are less melodic and usually flow around a rather simple chord pattern. The musicianship is of the highest order with beautiful Fender Rhodes sounds, clean stratocaster guitar, tight funky jazz drums, thumping bass and a great assortment of wind-instruments. On side one 'Bedrock Deadlock' shows Ian Carr experimenting with avant-garde to little success in my humble opinion. Side two is perhaps a more pleasant listen with groovy jazz-rock that makes up for great sophisticated background music. Compared to the other records of this band in this era 'Solar Plexus' is less interesting for the progressive rock crowd and therefor I can only give it three stars. Do check out the other records by this band though!

In my review of their second album: "We'll talk about it later" I've stated it was a much improvement over the debut which I've described as nice. Well, I'm afraid I'm a bit in dispute with myself now :) After several listenings I consider the debut excellent. It is true their second is even better but the difference isn't big, as they were brilliant right from the start. "Elastic rock" is mostly relaxed (thankfuly not over-polished) but no less passionate and holds many beautiful themes and some dense moments for a good measure. Maybe even more jazz-rooted. It starts with thunderous drums and beautiful but short brass-driven melody to jump over to the next rather calm track, although with quite busy drums by John Marshall. This slowly emerging, a bit abstract and psychedelic feeling prevails through the whole album with all the instruments getting their chance to shine on the way. Not neceserily with speedy solos but with the feeling. Amazing stuff. I rate it with 4,5 star, just like I did with their third "Solar Plexus". Definitely my kind of fussion. Not knowing the later ones I cannot speak of them, but all their first three albums are VERY highly recomended for jazz rock/fussion fans,

Nucleus (here led by Ian Carr as he was the main composer) was one of the major players in the jazz-rock-fussion premier league. Their third release Solar Plexus is another proof to that, as it easily stands shoulder to shoulder with the best of the genre (Mahavishnu Orchestra, Soft Machine, Weather Report). The music is based on two musical themes and the band is expanding them to work out their relation to each other in the end. As the result the album is a combination of outhere atmospheres with realy groovy drive - it must be my sweet spot as I enjoy it tremendously. 4 and a half star from me.

Unbelievably good! It's probably my favourite album of the whole fussion genre. I love Soft Machine, Mahavishnu is very good obviously, Weather Report too and of course Miles and Herbie are both titans, but this Nucleus is something special. Significantly better from their first one, which is nice, but "We'll talk about it later" is another level. The musicianship is flawless, the compositions brilliant, the improvisations marvelous. I know I'm not very specific here, but it's hard to be when dealing with a masterpiece like this. There is a place for calm and beautiful moody moments and for frenetic interplay. There is always something interesting going on but never too dense which in some cases can make a listener a bit tired and tracks hard to differ one from another. But not here, here everything is in the right dose, vocals included. Perfect! I'm listening with awe.

What a spirit! Trumpet player Ian Carr has been head of this crew, yet existing until 1989, called up as pioneers of Jazz Rock with good reason. Anyhow, concerning this line-up in 1971, if you are genre affine somehow, two other names are absolutely striking in the first instance. Karl Jenkins (keyboards) and drummer John Marshall also were longtime Soft Machine key figures later. You won't fail to recognize this sound-wise. They are opening with the absolute highlight Song For The Bearded Lady which features some wonderful jam appeal. The song's main theme later will appear on Soft Machine's 'Bundles' again, while showing Alan Holdsworth in the ranks. Backed by a compelling groove all members are coming into bloom here with some solo activity more or less.

Chris Spedding is responsible for the guitar playing, not in the same unique Holdsworth style of course, but absolutely fancy-pancy too, especially while beautifully interacting with Jenkins. Strong wind instrument implementation to notice, not only by Carr, but also due to Brian Smith on sax and flute. Some oriental touch given by the way on the following Sun Child. This stuff must have inspired the German Embryo crew too, I'm sure. Just mentioning Oasis for example some avantgarde moments leaning towards Miles Davis are presented. Well, this is an album I'll be stuck to as long as I'm still breathing. The extraordinary verve decreases a bit towards the end, otherwise I would have rated this a masterpiece of prog music with ease. 4.5 stars.

I absolutely adore this album.

One of the better fusion-albums from the UK. The trumpet of Ian Carr is very recognizable, almost like Miles Davis or Roy Hargrove. A lot of bop-styled trumpet, with some great sax-work aswell.

But the accompanying music is more funky, stylized with lots of piano and electric piano, percussion and some funky bass. This is not high-octane jazz rock fusion like Return to Forever and Weather Report but more laid-back birth of the cool- jazz rock fusion. I like this more laidback style.

All members of this Ian Carr's Nucleus were also members of Nucleus, so I don't really understand the name-change. But a lot of jazzrock bands did the same (Return to Forever, Headhunters). The bandleader's name is more important than the bandname itself. But to me this is just another Nucleus album.

NUCLEUS and its frontman, trumpetist Ian Carr (the albums we are now dealing with have both the band name and Carr's name on top of them, in various combinations) were among the leading acts in the British jazz fusion scene in the early seventies. Those listeners that are into the [post-Third] jazz era of SOFT MACHINE, are most likely already familiar with Nucleus -- and if not, in Nucleus they will surely find another band to appreciate. In fact several musicians who had played in Nucleus joined Soft Machine: Karl Jenkins, Roy Babbington, Allan Holdsworth, John Marshall... This brand new Esoteric Recordings release Torrid Zone is a 6-disc (in total 6 h 20 min) box set containing nine Nucleus/Carr albums released by Vertigo in 1970-1975: Elastic Rock, We'll Talk About It Later, Solar Plexus, Belladonna, Labyrinth, Roots, Under the Sun, Snakehips Etcetera and Alleycat.

The 48-page booklet features the album informations and an essay written by rock journalist Sid Smith. Since the chronological continuum of the albums understandably divides many of them into two discs -- one disc having material from as many as three albums -- at least the booklet could have been slightly more systematically edited; for example the album covers are in many cases placed somewhere else, in the middle of the essay. Also I wish, as usual, that the track lengths were marked. Especially when they vary a lot, it would be good to know whether you're listening to a brief or a 15-minute piece.

In a nutshell, Nucleus played instrumental fusion/jazz-rock in which jazz is the dominant part of the equation. Trumpet, flugelhorn, saxes and flutes are central in the arrangements, but also guitar is often essential. Some of these albums are entirely composed by Ian Carr and some have many composers. Releasing nine albums in five years, what a work ethic Ian Carr had! No wonder that the line-up was under a constant change. The best known albums especially in prog circles are the first two that share the same line-up (e.g. guitarist Chris Spedding and reeds/keys player Karl Jenkins). Elastic Rock is seen as one of the most noteworthy fusion albums all time. Excuse me for not going into album-by-album analysis or into describing music in a more detailed fashion, I'll just pick up some interesting notions. Solar Plexus is, according to Carr's original liner notes, "based on two short themes which are stated at the beginning ('Elements I & II'). The first theme is angular and has a slow, crab-like movement: the second theme is direct, simple and diatonic". There are two shorter pieces exploring both themes, while 'Snakehip's Dream' "tries to fuse both themes". That long piece which Carr had been developing for a whole year was a sort of a musical blueprint for future Nucleus releases.

The Ian Carr album Belladonna features a relatively compact small group of six musicians. For me one of the most interesting albums here is Belladonna's follower Labyrinth (1973), a more "widescreen" work which was inspired by the Greek myth of the the Minotaur. Vocalist Norma Winstone has quite a big role on a couple of tracks. This album also features another celebrated trumpetist, Kenny Wheeler. BTW, drummer Tony Levin is just a name-sake of the famous bassist. Roots (1973) uses the vocals of Joy Yates, to a lesser extent. For the next album Under the Sun (1974) the whole line-up around Carr was changed (e.g. reeds player Bob Bertles, keyboardist Gordon Beck and guitarists Jocelyn Pitchen and Ken Shaw). The two final Vertigo albums albums, Snakehips Etcetera and Alleycat (both 1975) are funkier in style.

Ian Carr's most productive years as a musician ended during the 80's for health reasons. Alzheimer's disease led to his death in 2009. Today he is a notable forefigure for the new British jazz generation. This package of nine albums is a great hommage to his timeless work.

Nucleus ' Elastic Rock (1970)

I liked this record at first spin. Obviously you can hear influences from Miles Davis (In a Silent Way, Bitches Brew) and Soft Machine (that warm thick sound). The energy and vibe of the record reminds me a bit of early Colosseum at its jazziest. The rock influences are little, but enough to give the record that warm heavy psych sound. Nucleus has a nixe mixture of composition and improvised solo's of wind and electric guitar, without loosing their musical imagination and ability to offer the listener interesting atmospheres and harmonies. I think that's what makes the record attractive for listeners of progressive rock ' it's full of that adventurous spirit. Moreover, the drumming is exciting throughout. The album showers the listeners with great musical ideas, only to become slightly disjointed in the last three shorter tracks. Still a very consistent record. Artwork on the Akarma vinyl reprint is pure psychedelic bliss. Highly recommended for listeners of jazz-rock en eclectic prog.

Over all I'd call this an exceptionally good collection of experimental jazz-rock fusion songs with the artists all sounding like they are coming from the jazz world trying to cross over into rock. Though not all of it stands up as being "fresh" since so much J-R Fusion has come since this album's 1971 release, most times it works very well. Definitely a wonderful accomplishment for it's time.

1. "Song For The Bearded Lady" (7:25) upbeat, hard-drivin, great musical weave, great use of horns. At two minutes in the sound calms down to support Ian Carr's soloing. He sounds so much like American jazz great Freddie Hubbard it's uncanny! Background instrumentalists start getting a little frisky in the fourth minute (awesome!) but then Chris Spedding takes a turn in the lead as Karl Jenkins toys with him on the Hohner Electra piano in the opposite channel. in the fifth. Nice contrasting styles. Everybody remerges together for the final minute--an outro to bookend the intro. (14.5/15) 2. "Sun Child" (5:19) opens with some saucy, spacious bass, drums and guitar over which a soprano sax teases seductively. The interplay intensifies insidiously over the first couple minutes until it feels as if each instrument is kind of in their own world. The arrival of Ian's trumpet kind of soothes and shifts the direction and intensity of the collective, creating more space but less "competitiveness." (8.75/10)

3. "Lullaby For A Lonely Child" (4:21) opens with delicate bass, cymbal and electric piano interplay before controlled yet emotional trumpet takes the lead. Support is joined by gently picked guitar and saxes before a little whole-group chorus spaces out the next section of trumpet and bouzouki solos. Intensifies slightly for the second chorus but then bouzouki takes us to the end. Pleasant but nothing to write home about. (8.25/10) 4. "We'll Talk About It Later" (6:19) opens with some raunchier guitar sound accompanied by subdued bass, hi-hat, and Hohner. Accompanying instruments shift into second gear as the song becomes fully blues. Guitars, Hohner, and drums all shift into third and fourth gears as bass and muted trumpet remain rock steady until the second half of the third minute when trumpet takes on a more prominent roll. Has a very DOORS-like quality and sound. Chris Spedding's free-wailing guitar really stands out on this one. (8.5/10)

5. "Oasis" (9:49) opens as if all instrumentalists are in their own world, expressing their own moods, until around 1:50 the keys' chord selection become steady, guitar strums, bass line and cymbal play support this. Horns too, before trumpet goes off on a solo. Guitars, drums and keys start amping up their inputs as Ian continues to solo into the fifth minute. At the end of the fifth minute, Ian goes a little freestyle but then everybody else softens and backs down, making room for a prominent muted soprano sax solo in the sixth, seventh and eighth minutes. Drums begin to go rogue in the seventh and eighth before a calm appears in which Brian Smith continues playing his sax as Chris Spedding and Jeff Clyne's bass take more foreground prominence. Horn section enters to bring everybody together just before the end. (18/20)

6. "Ballad of Joe Pimp" (3:48) Vocals! Sounds like it could come off of an early SOFT MACHINE album. Horns take over after the first verse. A very Philly R&B/Soul feel to this one. (8.5/10) 7. "Easter 1916" (8:47) Sounds like a classic experimental late 1960s experimental jazz fusion song as BRAINTKICKET-like vocals and keys are driven along by blues-rock bass, guitar and drums play. Its a great groove, despite it's odd meter. Melodic jazz sax solo in the third and fourth minutes becomes more free form in the fifth and sixth. Support instrumentation disappear in the seventh minute as drums solo while sax continues it's spitting and spouting. Awesome drum play! Ends with a familiar "Love Supreme" sound and drum solo. (19/20)

Total Time: 45:48

A-/five stars; a minor masterpiece of progressive rock music from the early era of Jazz-Rock Fusion experimentation.

This 1974 release from Ian Carr and his collaborators proves that as far as Nucleus goes, there truly is nothing new under the sun. It's not that this is a bad album - on the contrary, it's a pretty decent jazz-rock workout. It's just that it isn't really doing anything we haven't already heard the group do with a bit more verve and passion on the group's earlier albums. Where a mere four to five years earlier Nucleus had been ahead of the curve when it comes to this sort of material, here they're sat solidly in the middle of the road, with the end result that you probably don't want to go out of your way to obtain this unless you really can't get enough of the band's sound.