UNDER THE SUN

Brian Smith is gone! Carrying over from Ian's Roots release from the previous year are guitarist Jocelyn Pitchen and bassist Roger Sutton, while blues-rock pianist Gordon Beck returns after a one-album hiatus. But Ian's long-time collaborator and partner in crime, Brian Smith, has moved on.

1. "In Procession" (2:54) opens with a cool groove: a variation of sorts of an early Herbie or Mahavishnu riff (one that will also be borrowed and mutated by Weather Report in the next few years). This one has multiple expressions of the main melody coming from several sources--including two horn players! (9.333/10)

2. "The Addison Trip" (3:58) another cool motif in which the keys and bass are following one melodic theme while the horns and drums and percussion seem to be on a different course--but the two woven together work! But this is short-lived as the song quickly devolves into a bass and drum show (with some support from keyboards and horns. The very sudden ending--as if the tape were just cut at some random point in the players' play--is quite disconcerting. Wish the opening 30-seconds could've continued . . . forever. (9/10)

3. "Pastoral Graffiti" (3:33) a flute-led piece that feels quite . . . pastoral. I love hearing the spinet/harpsichord sound among the support instrument for this rondo weave--and the joinder of Ian's smooth flugelhorn and everybody else's gentle contributions. (9.25/10)

4. "New Life" (7:07) my favorite song on the album for the sake of its powerful bass-driven motif and great trumpet and sax performances (and arrangements!). Nice drumming, too. I could have done without the major tempo and motif shifts at the halfway point but am happy to have been treated thereafter to some of my favorite Ian Carr trumpet soloing: great melodies, accented by electric piano and wah-wah-ed electric guitar. (If I'm not mistaken, Ian, himself, plays with some wah-wah effects in this historic trumpet solo.) (14.125/15)

5. "A Taste Of Sarsaparilla" (0:44) solo trumpet with chorused electric piano in support. Pretty melody--played with Freddie Hubbard-like sensitivity! (4.5/5)

6. "Theme 1: Sarsaparilla" (6:47) building, of course, on the brief melody introduced in the "A Taste of ..." predecessor but quickly becoming something like a Herb Alpert & The Tijuana Brass motif that's been elevated to the next highest level (thereby disqualifying it for game show theme song honors but keeping it well within the realms of highest-level Jazz-Rock Fusion). An odd pause in the third minute results in a return to the main theme (with all its power and vigor) while Gordon Beck takes us on a ride with his electric piano. At the end of the fourth minute there is another slow down where the band seems to get lost--discombobulated--while Bob Bertles solos on an alto sax, but then everything turns right again as Roger and Bryan zip back into the fast lane. It's pretty cool when Ian joins Bob in the soloing department to kind of challenge one another but actually do their own thing, and then they come together for a recapitulation of the main theme before extraneously flying into their awesome ending flourishes. Cool! (13.75/15)

7. "Theme 2: Feast Alfresco" (6:02) slowed down, the band joins Roger and Bryan with a slowed-down "choral" recitation of the Sarsaparilla main theme for a minute or so. Then everybody but guitar, bass, and drums clears out to give Bob Bertles room to lay into his baritone sax, keys and percussion providing some support accents. Then one of the guitarists is given the spotlight while Gordon and Geoff riff and run between he and the rhythm section. Weird to hear no horns for such a long patch of an Ian Carr/Nucleus song, but they reappear as a horn section to remind us of the main themes toward the end of the guitar and Fender Rhodes duel soloing that occurs in the song's final two minutes. (9/10)

8. "Theme 3: Rites Of Man" (10:00) wandering, meandering electric pianos with distant horn blasts--some echoed, some spewed--are eventually joined by bass, drums and percussion--coercing the keys to step in line. Long notes from the horn section are accented by the two Rhodes and by wah-wah-ed electric guitar riffs and rhythms. Settling into a pensive, repetitive vamp-like mode, over which the trumpet and saxes solo while drummer Bryan Spring and Gordon Beck as percussionist ramp up their inputs. Sounds very Miles Davis-like. Bryan is given some clear solo time in the seventh and eight minutes, the result being more impressive than I expected: he has a bit of the ability to make his solo drumming melodic like Billy Cobham does. Bass and electric piano return toward its end with horn section doing its Miles melody/theme reminders before sax and electric guitar (I believe this one is Jocelyn Pitchen) get some solo time (at the same time--briefly, just before the end). Weird ending as it feels as if the musicians just walk away from the song . . . and studio--and just leave it empty. Weird. What has all this to do with Sarsaparilla? Still, quite a well- formed, well-performed, if weird song. (18/20)

Total Time: 41:05

I feel as if I connected to Ian & Company's highly-skilled yet intermittently loose renderings of some very mature compositions on a deep yet easy level. For once it feels as if Ian himself was the one musician that reigned supreme even when he wasn't the spotlight performer. (I still wonder why so few musicians stay with Ian for very long.)

A-/five stars; a most excellent, most mature display of top-quality rendering of top-quality compositions. Definitely a minor masterpiece of peak era Jazz-Rock Fusion.

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