Jazz Record Albums

Some recommended jazz rock groups:

Brand X

Bruford

Gong (Expresso period)

Mahavishnu Orchestra

Jean-Luc Ponty

 

Flip_Stone wrote: Some recommended jazz rock groups: Brand X Bruford Gong (Expresso period) Mahavishnu Orchestra Jean-Luc Ponty

 

Flip thanks for the recommendations. Please note, this thread is aimed at letting others on PA know of new releases and reissues by bands/artists in the jazz rock field, who may not be listed in the archives but should be heard. e.g.

Talking of Brand X, try: Tunnels' Progressivity

 

wrt Mahavishnu, try McLaughlin's The Promise with an all star line-up

or the excellent modern re-interpretators of MO's music Mahavaishnu Project (and both Jan Hammer and John McLaughlin approved):

 

for (the jazz rock) Gong, try Gongzilla (go to their website for the best album deals):

  

 

And my current favourite in the jazz rock area the Screaming Headless Torsos' compilation Choice Cuts:

How about Michael Mantler/Edvard Gorey - "The hapless child and other inscrutable stories" (ECM/WATT 1976). Avant jazz/prog or something like that.
Robert Wyatt on vocals, Steve Swallow on bass, Rypdal on guitar, Carla Bley on kbds, Jack DeJohnette on drums. Amazing. Fantastic.

meurglysIII wrote: Dick, I have nothing associated with the ECM label except for an EDQ album, which I like. I was just wondering if you could recommend a "definitive" one, I'm up for anything really, and interested in testing out some recordings from members on that label. Thanks. How about Michael Mantler/Edvard Gorey - "The hapless child and other inscrutable stories" (ECM/WATT 1976). Avant jazz/prog or something like that. Robert Wyatt on vocals, Steve Swallow on bass, Rypdal on guitar, Carla Bley on kbds, Jack DeJohnette on drums. Amazing. Fantastic.

Meurglys

Where do start with an outstanding independent record label, renown for its jazz, jazz rock, free jazz, avante jazz, avante rock, world fusion and even RIO. BTW Watt is an American indie label handled by ECM, for which the Austrian trumpet Michael Mantler and Carla Bley are probably the best known artists.

So starting with the more avante jazz/rock and perhaps the more challenging recommednations here, then some try Michael Mantler, like the album mentioned above. Mantler tends to encourage the best vocal performances from people as wide ranging as Robert Wyatt, Jack Bruce, Marianne Faithfull, Kevin Coyne, while singing lyrics by Pinter, Beckett etc. You tend to find unusual combinations of musicians with Mantler too, e.g.  I think on a  live album you'll find Jack Bruce, Nick Mason and Ian Underwood........Also greatly like Movies by Mantler with a line-up that includes Tony Williams, Larry Coryell, Steve Swallow. Carla Bley's masterwork is probably Escalator Over The Hill (originally a 3 LP set, now two CD set) witha massive line-up of rock and jazz musicians. BTW what I've always considered to be really a Carla Bley album disguised as a Nick Mason album is Fictitious Sports (Harvest), with Robert Wyatt as an added bonus on vocals.

To ECM. I'll suggest ~ 10, in no particular order but guarantee others will come up with completely different choices of equal validity.

Cloud About Mercury: David Torn. Mark Isham and the then current Krimson rhythm section playing - and setting the way for B.L.U.E

Night: John Abercrombie, Jan Hammer, Michael Brecker & Jack DeJohnette.

Rosensfole: Agne Buen Garnas, Jan Garbarek. A classic of world fusion, mixing medieval Norwegian folk  music with modern synths and largely Indian percussion

Pat Metheny Group: American Garage - my first introduction of Metheny here doing great  guitar lead jazz rock and stilll a favourite 25 years later. Actually Pat Metheny's Rarum: Selected Recordings  released about 18 months ago, is a near perfect collection of tracks from  Metheny's ECM years

Ralph Towner: Solo Concert. Master of the 12 string acoustic and clsssical guitars in stunning solo form live in concert

John Surman: Road To St Ives. Part of Surman's experiment in one man  ambient jazz.

Terj Rypdal : Chaser - hard edged jazz rock. The title track is a tour de force and worth the price of the CD: Rypdal with the effects and all stops out

Zakir Hussain: Making Music, Indo jazz fusion from the original Shakti tablalist - and the only album with both Garbarek and McLaughlin together

Lots of excellent albums by bassist Eberhard Weber, and those on which he guests (esp. Jan Garbarek albums of the 90's). Ampersonal  favourite is the mid 70's album by Gary Burton Quintet (featuring a very young Pat Metheny) and Eberhard Weber as a the named guest is  Ring. Remember Burton was one the earlier jazz men to experiment with rock in the 60's.

SImilarly with English double bassist Dave Holland, too many good ones to choice, but perhaps with view to the Coleman's M-Base experiments of the late 80's try Dave Holland Quintet's The Razor's Edge, with Coleman and Robin Eubanks in the line up

Miroslav Vituous ditto. ECM seem largely to record/release Vitous as a double bass player, but with To Be Continued (with Rydpal and Jack DeJohnette) you'll hear his last great album playing electric bass.

Everyman Band: Without Warning Avant jazz rock with David Torn (guitars & loops) and Marty Fogel  on near free- jazz sax.

And finally, the present with nu.fusion: check out Nils Petter Molvaer's Solid Ether - muted trumpet, part inspired by Miles Davis, with drum'n'bass and scratch, for chill-out variations of European chamber 'jazz'(???)

Start point you may ask? David Torn's  Cloud About Mercury

  John Abercrombie (guitarist) most notably Timeless, Night and Getting There
  Beautifully constructed melodies and improvisation.

  For me Pat Metheny is to Yes (bright, transparent)
 what John Abercrombie (dark, deeper) is to King Crimson.

Thanks for all that information.

nobody wrote: The Fourth Way is a seminal and vastly underrated band that existed from 1968-1970, consisting of Mike Nock (keyboards), Michael White (violin), Ron McClure (bass) and Eddie Marshall (drums).  They made 3 records for Capitol's "progressive" imprint Harvest: The Sun and the Moon Have Come Together (a live concert from Berkeley, California in 1968), The Fourth Way (their only studio album, pictured above, from 1969), and Werwolf (a live album from the Montreux Jazz Festival, 1970).  Of these, only the first one has ever been on CD and that disc has been out of print for close to 20 years. All 3 of these smoke, but the latter one from the Montreux festival just about melts your stereo... they have a furious, spacey/jammy sound, tons of improvisation, kind of like the Ian Carr-led band Nucleus but even more out there and "free".  If you can find any of these albums you should not hesitate to grab them... they feature a great balance between earthfunk and spacejam that is totallly unique and fantastic.

Excellent news. Stuart Nicholson in his Jazz Rock A History  spends a chapter or two on pre-Bitches jazz rock, but many of those recordings have been slow to appear on CD*. To date I have relied on a burn taken for a LP copy of the first album, and have a copy of violinist's  Michael White's late 70's Lp The X Factor - which  was more about trying to jump on the jazz funk band wagon of the late 70's.


*What comes to mind wrt CD reissues are: Count's Rock Band, a couple of Charles Lloyd albums. And wrt to the broader range of fusion  the first two John Mayer/Joe Harriott Indo Jazz Fusion Double Quintet albums are available as a twoforone, Mike Westbrooks Marching Songs (Vol 1 and 2), and Ian Carr's pre-Nucleus recordings with Don Rendell (?). And I think some of Gary Burton's records???  What about some of those mid-60's albums of the NYC collective which had Larry Coryell, Mike Brecker involved?

Just picked up this statement of endorsement  on the Fusenet website

Quote:

And let me add a quote for my favorite Michael Mantler recording - For Something There:
"For Something There (june 1982), Mantler returned to his classical
obsession, scoring another suite for jazz-rock quintet (guitarist Mike Stern, Carla Bley on piano, Steve Swallow on bass and Pink Floyd's drummer Nick Mason) and a string orchestra."

I simply love this CD...

End Quote

A reminder that Nick Mason did get in with really serious jazz company.

Recent recommendations, stemming from the PA Jan Hammer discography and prompting by those who know here:

Elvin Jones: Up The Mountain (John Coltrane's favourite drummer, and Hammer in pretty serious straight jazz mode.

Horacee Arnold: Tales Of An Exonerated Flea - and with a real who's who of jazz rock: Jan Hammer, Rick Laird, John Abercrombie, Ralph Towner, David Earle Johnson, etc. Great album, great groove and why have I missed for 30+ years until now? If you like Mahavishnu, RTF, Oregon, etc. you have to try this record.

 

 

mrgd wrote:    CHRISTIAN MCBRIDES ' VERTICAL VISIONS" is good--also 'SCI-FI".Great accoustic and electric bass playing with ahot band I think.

And his reaction to being a disciple to the Wynton Marsalis creed of jazz -purityfor a long time and then discovering Weather Report recordings!!!!

Dick Heath wrote: Aim here is to list some good jazz rock albums by artists not as yet included in the archives, but importantly recently recieved and played.> ... Virgil Donati: Just Add Water (http://www.virgildonati.com/).  Jazz rock improv jam by the Planet X's Aussie drummer VD (before he joined Derek Sherinian), and Scott Henderson in incredible form ...

Virgil Donati is one of my favourite drummers, and probably one of the most skilled in the world. I haven't listened to that album, but I wll

Thanks for the hint.


Edited by kidofthecentury