Artist : John McLaughlin/Jaco Pastorius/Tony Williams
Album : The Trio Of Doom
Label : Legacy / Columbia
Genre : Fusion
Bitrate : 204 kbps avg
Source : CD (LP)
Playtime : 00:39:41 (62.7MB)
Rls date : 2007-06-29
Store date : 2007-06-26
[Track List]
1. Drum Improvvisation (Live) 2:26
2. Dark Prince (Live) 6:36
3. Continuum (Live) 5:11
4. Para Oriente (Live) 5:43
5. Are You The One, Are You The One? (Live) 4:54
6. Dark Prince (Studio) 4:08
7. Continuum (Studio) 3:49
8. Para Oriente (Alternate Take One) (Studio) 1:06
9. Para Oriente (Alternate Take Two) (Studio) 0:20
10.Para Oriente (Studio) 5:28
Certainly the potential of a recording by this trio
featuring guitarist John McLaughlin and drummer Tony
Williams (both members of Lifetime with organist Larry
Young) along with bassist Jaco Pastorius -- aka the Trio
of Doom -- is enormous. This compilation contains a
performance of the trio at the Havana Jam in 1979, a U.S.
State Department-sponsored cultural tour by a large number
of American musicians who played on the same stage as
Cuban aces. The band rehearsed and had about 25 minutes on
the stage. Five days after leaving Cuba, the band
reconvened in a New York City studio and recut most of the
tracks. The studio versions (cuts six, seven, and ten)
were released on a pair of various-artists compilations
from the Cuban concert. McLaughlin felt at the time that
the live performances were unusable because of Pastorius'
playing. He relates the details in brief in the liner
notes by Bill Milkowski. What this means, of course, is
that out of ten cuts here, seven have never been released
before. That said, the sum total of all the music that the
group cut together is a little less than 40 minutes. From
this, the opening drum solo by Williams takes up nearly
three, and 20 seconds is of an alternate take of the
drummer's "Para Oriente." But this is not a dodgy rip
simply assembled to make money from the stuff of myth.
Well, it is designed to make money from myth, but there is
some seriously intense music here.
For starters, Williams' drum solo that opens the album is
to die for. There is no excess, no showing off -- only an
intense orgy of rhythm. When McLaughlin and Pastorius join
him, the crowd must have gone crazy because he shifts
nonstop into the guitarist's composition "Dark Prince."
While his solo is overdriven, distorted, and rangy, full
of angles and twists and turns, Jaco's playing on the
head, and in taking the tune out, is solid. Perhaps at the
time this didn't seem up to snuff, but it's hard to hear
that based on the disc. The entire band is engaged with
focused attention, ascending scalar and harmonic peaks
together for its six and a half minutes. It is followed by
a beautiful ballad by Pastorius called "Continuum," which
appeared on his self-titled solo debut for Columbia. It's
a gorgeous and deeply melodic ballad, and the bassist's
playing is intensely soulful and lyrical. McLaughlin's
chord shadings and voicings are not only supportive, they
bring weight and depth, as does the beautiful hi-hat work
of Williams. (Speaking of which, on "Dark Prince" and
elsewhere, it's obvious that Williams is the true inventor
of the blastbeat, not some generic heavy metal drummer. To
hear his incessant bass drum and chronic cymbal-and-snare
workouts is inspiring.) "Are You the One, Are You the
One?," written by McLaughlin, closes the live set, and
it's a funky, kinetic, and knotty jam with Williams
playing breaks as well as pummeling the toms to get the
funk up out of the thing. Pastorius' groove is incessant,
even when he is matching the guitarist note for
contrapuntal note. That's the good news. The studio
versions of these cuts may "sound" better technically --
mostly due to the amplification and balance given the drum
kit -- but they lack the raw edginess of the live sides.
Still, fans of the fusion era, and those interested in any
of these personas, will be much edified by what is found
here. If only there were more of it.