THE BELIEVER

This live album may be described with very few words: a fusion of progressive jazz and indian ethnic, but it would be reductive. The use of tablas or other ethnic instruments doesn't have a particular meaning.

"5 in the morning 6 in the Afternoon" has a rhytmic bas of tablas, but McLaughlin's guitar sounds as in Friday night in SF. A very clean jazz sound and virtuosism. What's remarkable is the perfect synchronism between percussions and guitar.

"Ma No Pa" is slightly different from the previous track. It's more athmospheric and all the four instruments are present here, not just a Laughlin-Hussein performance.

"Lotus Feet" has a slow guitar intro, very melodic, almost classical. Music for a summer night (and my fovourite, too).

"Maya" is another slow piece mainly made of guitar. Four minutes of relaxing music, then percussions become parossistic. The nice thing is that even if Zakir and John play a lot of notes, they are able to retain the same athmpsphere. The second part of the track is more ethnic.

"Anna" has this parossistic high number of notes but with a relaxing effect. This time fast and slow parts are alternated.

"Finding the Way", which closes the album, has an attractive rhythm. There are pauses which give the possibility to applaude. There's also a long ghatam solo. This looks more like a medley than a single song, but this is jazz and it makes no difference.

An excellent live album.