Released: 1976
Tracks: Donna Lee; Come On, Come Over; Continuum; Kuru/Speak Like a Child; Portrait of Tracy; Opus Pocus; Okonkolé y Trompa; (Used to be a) Cha Cha; Forgotten Love
Best tracks: Okonkolé y Trompa & Continuum
Tracks to skip: I hate to say it, but Donna Lee
My world is officially, rocked. OK, so it has been for some time, but it’s being re-rocked right now. Yes, Jaco IS a bad ass. No, he is not the best bass player ever. I still think Victor Wooten is a better bassist, but I never saw Jaco play so I suppose it’ll always remain a mystery. You know, it doesn’t matter! What really matters is the quality of this, Jaco’s debut album. The quality is good, the quality is good. It goes without saying, but I’ll repeat it again: if you play bass this is essential. The things he does on this simply were not done in 1976 by bassists.
His tone on the fretless is beautiful. I mean, his playing on Continuum (a classic) just melts me. Every song (‘cept Donna Lee) has something to offer. The thing is, for me at least, so much of his playing (and the other guys too) is so subtle that you might miss some of the cool stuff he does. I don’t know why Donna Lee does nothing for me. It’s a really strange way to start an album and it features only Jaco and a conga player. That’s it. The melody of the song doesn’t come through very well and it sounds like he’s just playing a bunch of unrelated notes. It’s not too impressive and it’s actually pretty boring. But then we get Come On, Come over (with vocals by Sam & Dave) which saves the day. Come On is really so, and totally, funky. The rest of the tracks are instrumental and they’re all great. Too hard to pick a best track, because you have the fretless stuff on Continuum, the totally cool strings on Speak Like a Child, his harmonics and melody on Portrait of Tracy, the steel drums on Opus Pocus, the AMAZING bass harmonic workout on Okonkolé y Trompa, and it goes on and on and on.
To present-day ears a lot of this music sounds dated (the fusion stuff), but in this case I think it’s excusable to delve into such ‘old’ music. I like this album and recommend it, especially to bassists. And you non-bassist musicians: once your bass player hears this you’ll wish he/she never had. Bassists unite!
Rating: 92
Write a comment