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AlwaysHungry said:
Hi, WD -- I know you are a metal aficionado. These guys don't really fit that genre. The Mahavishnu Orchestra was one of the first so-called jazz/rock fusion bands of the '70s. They didn't have a Satanic vibe at all; their leader was a convert to Hinduism who had a guru, cut his hair short, quit taking dope, and wore all-white clothing on stage. Mahavishnu John McLaughlin and the drummer had previously played with Miles Davis. MMJ wrote music that incorporated elements of Indian classical music, jazz, funk, and Hendrix. It is, of course, very loud and fast.
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I know they aren't metal, that's abundantly clear in the clear, bright, uplifting tone that is nearly constant, even in their more atmospheric, almost gothic compositions; it's all sorts of jazz hybrid and assorted awesome.
I was just saying that for the kind of jazz they're playing (especially tunes like Awakening, One Word, Birds Of Fire, Meeting Of The Spirits, etc.,) it has a lot of the energy and tempo of death metal, without the heavy duty distortion and minor-centric negative tones. I know they weren't satanic, I did some reading up while I was listening last night, because how could I not, you know? I thought it was really cool that their initial line up was from such far flung corners of the world from each other, bringing in musical flavors and influences from all over to meld into one cohesive, magical tone. That kind of mixed influence in music, bringing in multiple cultures to play among each others strengths and musical textures, always seems to bring about unique and incredible creations. I was just saying that the speed and power of stuff like death and thrash metal is there, even though the tone isn't.
Also, not all death metal is satanic, some of it is just mean for the sake of being mean. That doesn't have anything to do with The Mahavishnu Orchestra being a kick-ass band; it's just something that a lot of people seem to think that I'm constantly surprised by.
Either way, I'm totally stoked that you posted the link; I've been grooving on these guys hard since I clicked on it, and I've pestered most of my family with emails containing links to their songs and albums. I'm gonna see about finding a place that sells the albums and order the ones I can get my meathooks on. \m/
 
AlwaysHungry said:
Here's a live recording from an "on" night.
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That's a hell of a night right there. I would have loved to have had the chance to see this band live. The way they play such intensive music, and bring out a tone and feel to it that it seems like a totally laid back groove; that's something incredible. McLaughlin absolutely shreds throughout this set, playing stuff that would make a lot of metal lead players pause and take a moment to make sure they were reading the right sheet of music. Hell, the whole band is blasting through mind bogglingly awesome riffage. I love how it just never seems to let up on the level of kick-assery that is going on.
 
I saw them live twice. They burned out rather quickly, but they were a very unique band while they lasted.
 
I know it's a little late AlwaysHungry, but I had to see a man about a dog. It kept me busy. I loved the Oz Noy Trio, and it, along with Return To Forever, has been put into my notebook under 'find more' with a fixative reading 'NOW'.
I don't remember things terribly well, so I have to make a lot of notes and check the lists a few times a day. The music list is a huge, sprawling, complicated webwork of notes, tangents, footnotes, trails, draws, fixatives, annotations, quantifications, and more. While it looks like a word puzzle and an encyclopedia got shitfaced together, had a kid, then all three of them threw up into my notebook (my brother's words, from when I asked him to look through it real quick and read me a snippet from the 'Minor Proto-Metal and End of 60s Stoner Hard Rock Era' compendium and gathered associations for a letter I was writing. He gave up trying to find the passage I was looking for, and wanted to know if he could take a couple pictures of the notebook to show his friends), it does work for me in terms of organization and presentation for references.
With the three groups you've introduced me to, I've started a new branch on the music note tree for jazz fusion. I had some Dixieland jazz stuff in there, from when I used to go to the concerts around California with my grandparents when I was a kid, but they are woefully underdeveloped branches. I simply never stuck with Dixieland as much as I thought I would, even if I still like hearing good, driving, jumping, Roy Rogers-sipping ragtime stomp.
Now, there is jazz fusion starting it's own section in the notebook, and I expect it to grow quite quickly. I've found I have quite a liking for it, far more than I would have thought before giving it a listen.
As an aside, here is a song from my own (horribly, wretchedly, damningly) misspent youth. I know it probably isn't to your taste, but I would ask that you simply give it at least one fair and objective listen. I've no illusions that hearing one song will change a person's taste in music or their view of a genre; but given the aural flavors I find in stuff like Mahavishnu Orchestra's Awakening (so good), I think you might find some of the parallels I'm seeing that have my earholes wanting more. This is an instrumental version (so no worries about guttural 'singing' to try to ignore) of a Cannibal Corpse song called Frantic Disembowelment. I know, I know; so tacky and infantile in its obviously over-the-top approach to trying to be shocking and offensive, to the point that it's probably getting into the realm of self-parody. But that isn't what I like about this kind of music. I don't really care about the immature take on 'shocking' that so many of these bands focus on so blindly. What I find so fascinating is the music itself. This video really does a pretty good job of showcasing just that; stripping away the pretend pageantry of the image that the band projects in their album concepts, lyrical content, overall sound, and their live performances, leaving just the music (sans vocals, in this case. This is kind of an important point, but I think in this case you'll find it less tedious without George 'Corpsegrinder' Fisher vomiting out the lyrics in his almost-voice. The vocals in bands like this aren't typically meant to be understood, the way vocals are in bands like The Animals, The Beatles, Queen, Black Sabbath, or even bands like Exodus, Testament, or Nuclear Assault, where the vocals are more distorted and harsh, but still mostly decipherable. The vocals for bands like Cannibal Corpse, Vektor, Skeletonwitch, and Vader are meant to be another instrument, like another distorted guitar, more than they are to tell an understandable story. That's why they include the lyrics in the album sleeve; so that you can read what the hell was just burped and gargled between guitar solos. Even bands like Razor knew this, and they had mostly understandable vocals. The Razor song The Marshall Arts is an instrumental, with each instrument represented, including Stace 'Sheepdog' McLaren, who opens the song with a 25 second scream that hurts my throat just hearing it every time the song comes up in my playlist).
In this song, I hear a lot of disjointed scales and odd jumps in what notes are moved too, from an auditory point of view. Scales that wouldn't normally be considered to 'fit' together, as it were. It's something I've heard a lot in the jazz I've been hearing the last couple days, and when done just right, I think it sounds great. There are plenty of times when Cannibal Corpse doesn't do it just right, of course, but for the most part, they do alright. Anyways, heres the song, to give you an idea of what I'm talking about.
Here it is, a studio rehearsal video of the audio track for just the instruments in Frantic Disembowelment:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t4zTvdN_38Y

It isn't just the more metal aspects of jazz fusion that are drawing me to it, though. There's clearly a hell of a lot of talent, a lot of skill, and a mountain of love of music that is going into the stuff I'm hearing in Mahavishnu, Oz Noy, and Return to Forever. I've got Weather Report's self-titled album playing now, and while it's definitely a much softer, more mellow strain of jazz, it's also a damn fine one to my ears. There's more to the music than just sound, more than just a handful of people sitting in a room with a recorder laying down tracks to get an album out for a paycheck, or trying to make something that will appeal to the largest customer-base possible; there's real emotion in the music I'm hearing, and it creates real emotion in me when I listen. To me, that is what makes music music and not just some stuff that some people recorded that sounds nice.
While I'm primarily a metal guy (surprise surprise, right?), I try to listen to music from all sorts of genres, and I try to listen to a lot of stuff that I don’t like, especially when I hear something that clearly involves musical innovation or inspired composition, even if the music itself doesn't do anything for me. I like to hear the mechanics of stuff I don’t like, to get another look at what makes music so great, even if the particular mechanics I am currently investigating don’t sound so wonderful to my ear. There is still something to be learned there, an inspired formulation to be experienced, an expression of an artist to be taken in, a musical mechanic to be looked over and internalized to join with everything else I know or feel about music. That’s an important part of music for me, personally, and one of the reasons I end up listening to so much stuff, even when I don’t like a lot of it.
This isn't the case with jazz fusion, however. I find I like it just fine, and I intend to do a lot of investigating and exploration. \m/
 
wakingDown said:
As an aside, here is a song from my own (horribly, wretchedly, damningly) misspent youth.
Here it is, a studio rehearsal video of the audio track for just the instruments in Frantic Disembowelment:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t4zTvdN_38Y/
Click to expand...

My initial response is that the texture seems monotonous. I like to hear structure, drama. However, I know that jazz seems amorphous and monotonous to new listeners, before they learn to hear how the ideas develop. So, you are one of the guys in the video?

BTW, Weather Report would have been the next band that I had recommended. They went through a number of personnel changes and their style changed a lot.
 
And keeping with the musical family connections, here is Skip Marley, Bob's grandson, (Cedella Marley's son). He has the magic, for sure. :)

Cry To Me
 
AlwaysHungry said:
My initial response is that the texture seems monotonous. I like to hear structure, drama. However, I know that jazz seems amorphous and monotonous to new listeners, before they learn to hear how the ideas develop. So, you are one of the guys in the video?

BTW, Weather Report would have been the next band that I had recommended. They went through a number of personnel changes and their style changed a lot.
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No, I'm not in the video, that's the band in the studio. Besides, those guys are healthy, well-adjusted, successful, and talented. I would be out of place in there simply as a person, much less as a musician. No, I'm just a guy who grew up spending far more time in mosh pits and in drunken brawls than anyone ever should. I can play guitar, but nothing like that; especially now that my hands and spine are the way that they are. Punching people and things for a decade and a half does very little in the way of good in terms of playing guitar, unfortunately.
This was just one of the songs from when I was younger, that made me take a closer look at music. I was already picking music apart by the time the album came out, but not as in-depth as I eventually began to. This was one of the songs that I found myself drawn to in terms of wanting to learn every will wrinkle of it, to see what made it tick, why it made me feel the way that it did, why it worked so well in terms of texture and timing, to see how everything worked off of everything else.
While I understand that a lot of people hear stuff like this and don't hear anything special to it, it sounds great to me. I've always liked high speed, low note variance (I don't know if there's an actual term for it. Last Sacrament is good for this, in some songs. They are a microtonal death metal band from Florida; good stuff), palm muted heavy crunch (love that, the heavier and meaner the better. I like my music to sound the way I typically feel, and I've always been fast and mean, unfortunately), a lot of jumping lines that have odd or unexpected jumps in tone or key (Megadeth was great for this on the first few albums, and couple of the last ones, as was Death Angel, Slayer, and Exodus).
With bands like death metal bands like (and including) CC, a lot of it can be hard to pick out (ha ha, guitar dad joke). Between the speed they play at, the close proximity most of the notation changes occur within, and the heavy blast beat drumming (I'm not a big fan of constant, overriding blast beats, even if it does sound heavy. It just tends to drown everything out when it's used as the norm instead of as an accentuation) that they pour over just about every inch of the songs, and a singer that isn't singing so much as leaving their throat open yet tight and fixed while forcing air through it as hard and rough (ha ha. Yes, I have the same sense of humor as a 13 year old boy at times, and I'm fine with that) as they can, it's easy to miss a lot of what's going on.
I'm sure you've noticed by now, but don't actually know a lot about musical theory, nomenclature, or structure. I just love listening to music and studying it from a laymen's point of view. I guess I would be an amateur musician in both the original definition of the word and its modern permutation: I study music because I love it, even if I have no real means to take any learned courses from a scholarly source; and I have gained some knowledge about it without achieving anything that could be considered the beginnings of accomplished capability, or higher understanding, or above average skill in the field, much less mastery of any sort. For the most part, what I know about music is what I have felt the music move within me and the patterns I seen arise again and again across songs, artists, genres, and ages of music. Whatever that may ultimately be, however you want to phrase it, that's how I know what little I do about music.
I was just trying to show you some of the music I listened to when I was younger, that helped to shape the way I listen over the years. There were plenty of others, of course. Some that had larger impacts, some that had smaller. I've been listening to classic rock since birth; my dad has always filled the house with ZZ Top (his favorite band, and one of the ones I dearly love), Ted Nugent, Led Zeppelin (my favorite band since I was about six or so, and I think they are still at the top of the heap, right next to Black Sabbath, Queen, Slayer, Metallica, Dio, Mozart, and Three Dog Night, but I've always had a hard time picking a single favorite), .38 Special, Bob Seeger and The Silver Bullet Band, Procol Harum and all the rest of the best.

Angeline said:
I've been listening to Ledisi lately. She has been nominated for a bunch of Grammy awards, but more for R&B. I think she may have the best jazz voice around these days. She's also the granddaughter of the late (great) Johnny Ace.
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Angeline said:
And keeping with the musical family connections, here is Skip Marley, Bob's grandson, (Cedella Marley's son). He has the magic, for sure.
Click to expand...
This Ledisi has a scarily impressive voice; while she doesn't seem to dominate the songs like some R&B singers do, using power and projection in conjunction with more subtle technical skill to override the rest of the group and take center stage by sheer force of presence, she still steals the center of attention for me with her graceful, elegant control of her range, emotive capabilities, clear love for the music she is making. I like the jumpier, more energetic vibe in Round Midnight, and the bit of force she puts into some of the lines without turning to full-blown overwhelming belting; keeping the balance between her and the band quite nicely while still laying down some strong emphasis that gives the song that little extra bite to it. While not my typical cup of tea (I take my tea like I take my grape juice: I fill a glass with rum, tap the rim of the glass against the unopened bottle of grape juice, wave the glass in the general direction of the Pacific, and then drink), it certainly does have a lot of flavors that I get myself around with a smile on my face. The kind of stuff I can groove to while writing.
I like listening to fast, heavy, brutal stuff when I'm writing anything delicate, soft, or gentle, and when I'm writing anything more action oriented or otherwise intense, I prefer to have tunes that carry a mellow tone or a soothing flow. A kind of antipodean inspiration I suppose; the susurration of opposites and all that.
Skip is certainly performing with a lot of the family traits showing clear and distinct, and he's doing a great job of it. A very laid back, very soothing jam that feels perfect for a slow, rainy day or a bright, hurried one alike. A versatile, fits-any-mood emotional chameleon of a song. Perhaps that just me, just the way it strikes my tastes, but that's the way it feels when I listen to it. There're a few Bob Marley songs that I listen to here and there (it's a wonder that I'm not a bigger fan of Marley, given my spotted past and the habits I used to have) and this definitely makes me feel like I'm listening to a Bob jam at times, which isn't a bad thing to have happen.
The only thing that really sticks out for me as a drawback is the drumming. Now don't get me wrong, I'm perfectly fine synthesizers and keyboards in music (being a kid in the late 80s it was a part of my formative years, right up there with parachute pants, Day-Glo pink shirts, hi-top sneakers, mullets, and flat top hair with a rat tail), but synthesized drums always seem odd to me, and only feel like they fit in a couple of songs I've heard; they almost always feel strange and out of place, like the song was being recorded and the drum track was filled by a studio tech at a computer for the rest of the band to use for a time signature until the drummer showed up to lay down his line. Only the drummer never showed up because he got drunk in Barstow and missed his flight, and ended up getting into a fight with the gate attendant that got him arrested, so the studio just used the studio tech's synthesized drum line after trying and failing to find a stand in drummer, since the band is just oh-so-picky about their sound and who they want to work with as musicians, refusing to share musical credit on their album with people who 'are not in the band' or 'play in a different genre' or 'are meth-addicted drum techs the studio is just about to fire' or 'are a known felon currently wanted by the FBI' or whatever else. Anyways, yeah, electronic drums that sound so unabashedly electronic that they may as well be bleeps and bloops always stick out to me as odd, though they are by no means a deal breaker so long as rest of the song is good.
I just look at them the same way I look at overused blast beats or the more ridiculous vocal styles in death metal, or the instances where 'sampling' in hip-hop/rap is used in such a heavy handed way that it is readily apparent that the artist in question had no music to go with the song she or he had written and simply picked up a song from someone else and tooled it enough to use it for themselves: something that isn't exactly to my taste, but something that exists all the same. The entire world doesn't exist to cater to my every whim, no matter how much I bitch at it and insist that it should.
On a more serious note, I wanted to say thank you to all of you guys. I'm glad I had the chance to talk to some people about something simple and pleasant. I surely needed it the last few days. Thanks for putting up with my giant walls of rambling text about screaming, drunken, coke-addled bands, and for giving me some directions to some new stuff to dig through. I could do with the distraction at the moment.
 
My hometown has always had a great local music scene and has produced some very successful artists. Yesterday I learned of the sudden passing of one of them, an old friend from home. RIP TJ. :heart:

With Bonnie Raitt
Finest Lovin' Man

With the Edison Electric Band
Baby Leroy
 
Watched these guys perform Third Construction by John Cage tonight. Freakin' awesome.

The video rolls over to the Steve Reich piece (Mallet Quartet) they opened the concert with.

They also did the second movement of Cage's Living Room Music, as a kind of intermezzo, and Reich's "Clapping Music," as an encore.

A couple of other pieces that don't seem to be on YouTube.

Great evening.
 
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