THE TOYS OF MEN

After many years of danceable funk, pop-soundtracks, etc. one of the greatest jazz fusion bassist Stanley Clarke returned back to the music he became a star with. To his jazzy roots. But the year is 2007, so don't you expect to hear the clone music from early RTF time.

Clarke's bass is excellent as usual, but there are great music around it as well. Mostly contemporary jazz and jazz fusion. Even some jazzy vocals ( to be honest I prefer Esperanza Spalding playing bass, not singing, but her voice is very competent there). Very atmospheric, with playing electric and acoustic bass both, this album has it magnetism, and the reason is its vintage sound combined with some more modern techniques.

Rare balance between lighter jazzy numbers and sharper real jazz fusion (in the vein of early 70-s). Sometimes it looks that total track list is a bit on a safe side, with calculated proportion between harder and softer, between funky corners and jazzy roundness. But - the year is 2007, as I told above yet. So, it couldn't be a record from 1972. And for year of release, this album is really very strong one. And if you don't afraid of some contemporary jazz songs, you will be pleasantly surprised by this album (on the next one Clarke will make a deeper step into excellent contemporary jazz, with his trio, including Hiromi Uehara).