Since September 2010, this blog has recorded the journey of this music junkie as I attempt to listen to all the music in my CD collection. CDs revisited in their entirety from start to finish - no skipping tracks, no shuffle. Compact Discs only - no vinyl, no tapes, no files.

Tuesday, April 12, 2011

Jay Beckenstein - Eye Contact (2000)


Beckenstein is the leader of the jazz group Spyro Gyra and recorded strictly with that group for 25+ years until the release of this solo CD. He got together an team of smooth jazz all-stars (Chuck Loeb, Marcus Miller, Omar Hakim, Jason Miles, etc), so the result is predictable smooth jazz. It's not bad, but it's not Spyro Gyra, which I guess was the point of the CD to begin with. He must have sufficiently scratched the itch to record a solo album, because he's never released another one.

Tracks: the best on the disc are Sunrise and Northline. The cover of Charles Mingus' Goodbye Pork Pie Hat is very tasty. The other pieces are very listenable save for Monsoon, which is artsy noodling that is probably fun to play, but not so much fun to listen to.

Personal Memory Associated with this CD: None. I think I bought this on eBay, but, then again, I buy most of my CDs from eBay.

No comments:

Post a Comment