Sadao Watanabe - Orange Express (1981)

Japanese Import

I like smooth jazz and I cannot lie.

Watanabe had been well-respected as a straight-ahead and bossa nova sax player since the 1950's, but my favorite Watanabe is 1978-85 when his work more closely resembled Grover Washington, Jr. and Tom Scott (this particular album favors the latter). Recorded in NYC, there's a lot of familiar names backing up Watanabe: Dave Grusin, George Benson, Marcus Miller, Richard Tee, Eric Gale, and Jon Faddis. The writing is nondescript, but the performances are fantastic.

Album chart peaks:

• US Billboard Top 200: Did not chart
• Billboard Jazz: #17
• CashBox Jazz: #18

Tracks: Top tracks are the funky Ride On, Good For All Night, and the final two tracks (Straight To The Top & Mbali Africa), which both sound like they were lifted directly from a Stuff album.

Bonus tracks: Two versions of the pseudo-reggae-lite Yes I Love You. The best I can tell, the song was 1982 single-only Japanese release with an instrumental version on side A and a version with vocals from Ken Tamura on the flip. Both are presented here and neither is worth your time.

Personal Memory Associated with this CD: Around the time this album was released in 1981, I was starting my sophomore year in high school. We had six classes a day back then (now 8 is the norm); I "studied" Algebra II, Biology, World History, Health, English and had marching band as an elective. Of those six classes, five were taught by what I consider to be subpar teachers - some apathetic, some incompetent, some clueless, and some all of the above. So I had a rough year academically, but as far as my family was concerned, I was to blame, not poor instruction and assessment. I get it - when I was teaching, I wanted the parents on my side, too. In any case, my teachers for English and world history were so bad, they later achieved a sort of pseudonymic infamy in a chapter of my somewhat autobiographical doctoral dissertation. But that really doesn't have much to do with this album other than coincidental timing, so never mind. As you were.