Clarke/Corea/Henderson/Hubbard/White - The Griffith Park Collection 2: In Concert (1983)

A 2 CD live version of the group's 1982 studio album, recorded Friday, April 3, 1982 at the Circle Star Theater, near San Francisco. The band performs 4 of the tunes from that first album and takes the opportunity to stretch out - everybody gets a solo! - doubling and sometimes tripling the length of the tunes: the shortest track clocks in at 12 minutes, the longest almost 20. As drummer/producer Lenny White writes in his liner notes, Freddie Hubbard steals the show and "reaffirms his claim to fame as the premier trumpeter in the world." I could use less saxophone, but think it's a better overall album than the earlier studio release. Plus we're treated to great cover art, a 1937 oil painting entitled "Sheridan Theatre" by one of my favorite artists, Edward Hopper.

Stanley Clarke - bass
Chick Corea - piano
Joe Henderson - tenor saxophone
Freddie Hubbard - trumpet & flugelhorn
Lenny White - drums

Press of the time:

• Downbeat (★★★★½): "It's great to hear these guys hitting their stride on some fiercely creative extended jamming."

Album chart peaks:

• US Billboard 200: did not chart
• CashBox Jazz: #29

Tracks: The first four tracks are taken from the first album and includes what I think is the group's best original, Why Wait. The final two tracks are I Mean You, written by Thelonious Monk, and Here's That Rainy Day, a 1953 standard written by Jimmy Van Heusen for the short-lived, quickly forgotten musical Carnival In Flanders. 

Personal Memory Associated with this CD: None, but on April 3, 1982, I was recovering from a bad case of the measles. More on those adventures here: Adventures in One Act Play - Spring 1982. But that really doesn't have much to do with this live album other than coincidental timing, so never mind. As you were.

Previously revisited for the blog:
The Griffith Park Collection (1982)

Clarke/Corea/Henderson/Hubbard/White - The Griffith Park Collection (1982)

It's the old rhythm section from Return To Forever, but this time they've gone acoustic with the help of the addition of a couple of notable horn players. More post-bop and hard-bop instead of RTF's usual fusion. The same personnel on this album, plus singer Chaka Khan, recorded the throwback standards album, Echoes Of An Era, during the same recording sessions. The recording for The Griffith Park Collection was more spontaneous as the musicians played with minimal rehearsal. As described by the Elektra/Musician label:

and from the February 13, 1982 issue of CashBox magazine, p. 27:

I don't love it and that's because of the inconsistent material, not the performances (except when the musicians inexplicably try to coax nonidiomatic sounds out of their instruments). Maybe they should have stuck with standards?

Original album liner notes by Lenny White.

Stanley Clarke - bass
Chick Corea - piano
Joe Henderson - tenor saxophone
Freddie Hubbard - trumpet & flugelhorn
Lenny White - drums

Reviews/ratings:

• Musician: "I for one would like to see more of this"
• Downbeat (★★★): "a good album that could be much better"
• Stereo Review: "An invigorating exercise in the arts of improvisation and teamwork." Also designated a Recording of Special Merit and received 'honorable mention' by the magazine in its Record of the Year Awards for 1982.

Album chart peaks:

• US Billboard 200: did not chart
• Billboard Jazz: #35
• CashBox Jazz: #26
• Radio & Records Jazz Radio National Airplay: #29

Tracks: The better cuts are Why Wait (written by Stanley Clarke) and Remember (written by Steve Swallow).

Personal Memory Associated with this CD: None. This CD was purchased in an effort to collect all the releases on the Elektra/Musician label, 1982-84. Best estimates have me currently at 45 of 55 releases on either vinyl, CD, or both formats.

Lenny White - Venusian Summer (1975)

The debut solo album from White, who was the drummer for fusion group Return To Forever and had played with Miles on Bitches Brew. To be honest, I'm more familiar with later work with his R&B group Twennynine, so I bought this CD hoping for a taste of the jazzy-disco-funk subgenre of the mid-'70s. That's not what we've got here; this is more along the lines of the "new visions in sound" promised in the advertisement below. But once I geared my ear for sci-fi fusion instead of disco, I found a few cuts to enjoy here. After all, just look at this supporting cast:

So the musicianship is top-shelf, but not all the writing meets the musicians at their level, sadly. The best I can explain is that the music sounds much like the cover art looks (that cover art would also be a fantastic addition to the sides of a Chevy shaggin' wagon). There's also a few tracks that sound like Tangerine Dream recorded a soundtrack for the Star Trek TV series - track 3 here is The Venusian Summer Suite which is "dedicated to the crew of the Starship Enterprise" while the 12 minute album closer, Prince Of The Sea, bills itself as "the story of the young Prince becoming Neptune" and features a guitar duel between Coryell and DiMeola. Allmusic calls the album a "a must-have fusion recording" but reviews back in '75 were mixed.

Press of the time:

• Stereo Review: "everybody deliberately going cacophonous once in a while."
• Billboard: "jazz-rock and journeys into electronics"
• Record World: "alternately funky, impressionistic, and Mahavishnu-like jazz-rock"
• CashBox: "food for musical thought"

Album chart peaks:

• US Billboard Top 200: #177
• Billboard Jazz: #25

Tracks: My top pick is the funky Chicken-Fried Steak, followed by Away Go Troubles Down The Drain and the rocker Mating Drive.

Personal Memory Associated with this CD: None