Charlie Haden/Jan Garbarek/Egberto Gismonti – Magico (1980)

This one's not for me. By the end of the album, I was wondering to myself if my personal "ECM season" had passed and I should no longer look for ECM CDs in the used bins. But then I read the reviews that were less than favorable (save for the folks at Stereo Review) and now I'm thinking this one was simply a swing-and-a-miss. After all, nobody can bat 1.000. (Baseball analogies provided in honor of the opening of the 2026 MLB season.)

Reviews/ratings:

• Stereo Review: "ought to send you scrambling for the nearest record shop"
• Musician: "like gazing at a tree, knowing every leaf and branch is there for a reason, yet unable to trace the whole chain of consequence back to the trunk and the roots."
• High Fidelity: "Putting these three world-class jazzmen together was a great idea that somehow never ignited."
• CashBox: "There is nothing obvious about the music"
• DownBeat (★★½): "it is imbued with a studied hush and false intimacy that ultimately cloys and bores."
• The Penguin Guide to Jazz (5th ed., 2000):★★★
• The Rolling Stone Jazz & Blues Album Guide (1999): ★★
• The Virgin Encyclopedia of Jazz (1999): ★★★

Peak on the US Billboard Top 200 chart: Did not chart

Tracks:

Personal Memory Associated with this CD: None

Pat Metheny w/Charlie Haden & Billy Higgins – Rejoicing (1984)

In which Metheny leaves his fusion group for a bit to record some more staright-ahead bebop/free jazz with two of Ornette Coleman's sidemen: Charlie Haden on bass and Billy Higgins on drums. It's not my thing - it's not you, it's me - but I simply couldn't pass up an ECM-era Metheny CD sitting in a used bin.

In an article entitled "Pat Metheny Straight Ahead." (Guitar Extra!, Spring 1990, 56-64), Metheny had this to say about the album:

I did Rejoicing, which I really hated. That to me is one of the worst records I've ever made, if not the worst. That trio live had so much energy, so much spirit. But, when we did the record, the vibe in the studio was the worst vibe I have ever had in a recording studio. That record is the reason that I left ECM. I could not take Manfred Eicher anymore. He made it impossible to play on that date. What's on there is a struggle to try and get something over this dark blue barrier he had created between us and the tape. It was really bleak. There's a couple of things on there that are OK, like "Lonely Woman." The other thing is that the sound of that record is so weird. It's just so bad, muffled and reverby, and it doesn't have to be like that.

Yikes!

I was reminded of this album when I read this recent piece over at the Something Else website: Why Pat Metheny Fans Should Give ‘Rejoicing’ Another Listen. Further reading: ECMreviews site and the book Pat Metheny: The ECM Years, 1975-1984 by music scholar Mervyn Cooke.

Reviews/ratings:

• CashBox: "The album shows us the guitarist's very clear view of jazz past, present, and future."
• Billboard: "A luminous trio date"
• Musician: "Two and a quarter minutes of music isn't worth the price of the record"
• Downbeat (★★★★½): "shows the gifted guitarist playing with a scope and maturity only hinted at on Bright Size Life"
• The Rolling Stone Jazz & Blues Album Guide (1999): ★★★½
• The Virgin Encyclopedia of Jazz (1999): ★★★
• The Penguin Guide to Jazz (5th ed., 2000): ★★★½

Album chart peaks:

• US Billboard 200: #116
• Billboard Jazz: #4
• CashBox: #112
• CashBox Jazz: #1
• Radio & Records Jazz Radio National Airplay Chart: #2

Tracks:

My top picks are Lonely Woman and Story From A Stranger. Skip track 7, The Calling, which uses an unusually abrasive guitar-synth timbre and is most experimental cut on the album.

Personal Memory Associated with this CD: None

Previously revisited for the blog:

:rarum IX (2004)	Travels (1983)
Different Trains (1989)	Offramp (1982)
Letter From Home (1989)	As Falls Wichita... (1981)
Still Life (Talking) (1987)	80/81 (1980)
The Falcon & The Snowman (1985)	American Garage (1979)
First Circle (1984)	Watercolors (1977)