THE STORY OF I

Getting a little bored with the 'same old thing'? Are you genuinely looking for something unique? Then this unusual album from the 1970's just might be for you! Then again, there is a proverb about being careful what you wish for...

What should we even call this music? Jazz-Samba-Brazilian-Prog? World-Music Prog? Jazz Rock/Fusion? No - those descriptions all seem woefully inadequate to me. This is something you really must hear for yourself.

Will you *like* it on first listen? Perhaps. Perhaps not. It is certainly more listenable than many modern classical compositions. It has no shortage of melody and energy. And at the right moment, this one has the potential to flood into your consciousness as a glorious epiphany. Yes, this album has "grand slam" potential in terms of vitality, vision and creativity.

Yes, the production is a little dated. This is a 1976 album we are talking about after all. And everything from the arrangements, the mix, the vocals can be so unexpectedly quirky, even a tad jarring. But therein likes the genius!

This album gets criticized for lack of continuity. Yes, it jumps from "here to there" and back again. But should we really carry pre-conceived notions about stylistic "continuity" into every album? This can become a problematic limitation in my opinion. I'm very familiar with the commercial rock marketing "rulebook" in which an artist is supposed to "color within the lines" of certain stylistic expectations. But I must have somehow missed the Prog-Rulebook that decrees one must not have too much diversity on any one album!

Is there not something adventurous about being jolted out of your comfort zone in the middle of a listening session every now and then? Is there not something exciting about not knowing whether you will float upward or fall off a musical cliff at any given moment?

I'm not saying that I embrace totally *random* changes for the sake of change. But when an artist has a vision of where he is taking you and why he is taking you there, and when the changes fit into the storyline, should he be expected to pause and ask himself whether he might be getting too stylistically diverse? No! I say he should boldly blaze the trail wherever it leads him and leave the work of art for others to dissect and critique many years after the fact!

This is exactly what Patrick Moraz did. Is there any doubt he blazed a brazenly ambitious trail? Here we are. Over thirty years after this album was released. With over forty ratings at ProgArchives, more than one-quarter of them rate "The Story of i" as an "essential masterpiece" of prog. No small feat I assure you.

Don't miss this album! If you don't like it at first, pack it away for a year or two and pull it off the shelf again. For when you "get it"... (if when it "gets you") this album has the potential to "wow" you in a really special way. How can a progger possibly resist such potentiality?