Featured Artist: Soft Machine

Jazz CD cover CD Title: Floating World Live

Year: 2006

Record Label: Moonjune Records

Style: Fusion

Musicians: Mike Ratledge (Lowrey organ, electric piano, synthesizers), Karl Jenkins (oboe, soprano sax, recorder, electric piano, acoustic piano), John Marshall (drums, percussion), Allan Holdsworth (electric guitar, violin), Roy Babbington (bass guitar)

Review:

This newly released live date culled from Germany’s Radio Bremen archives marked a nexus of sorts for the now historic band.  Complete with reflective iterations by some of the musicians, these often-rousing works, feature material culled from the unit’s 1974  LP titled “Bundles.” 

Guitar god, Allan Holdsworth, is at the top of his game here to complement the largely, turbo-charged rhythmic endeavors set forth by drumming great John Marshall and bassist Roy Babbington. (On a side-note, Marshall is the drummer for the actively touring/recording ensemble known as Soft Machine Legacy.)  Otherwise, Holdsworth’s patented legato lines, diminutive phrasings; gushing with tremolo techniques and lightning fast single note lines, accelerate the musicians’ high-impact mindset.  With Roy Babbington’s fuzzed-out bass maneuvers and a stunning, polyrhythmic extended solo by Marshall, these live performances also highlight the ensemble’s melodic proclivities.

Holdsworth switch-hits by rendering a sonorous violin solo during the minor-classic” The Man Who Waved at Trains,” segueing into the hard-hitting jazz-rock groove witnessed on “PEFF.”  And while keyboardist Mike Ratledge’s chunky, analogue synth solo spot on “North Point” might seem a bit dated, it does conjure up fond memories of a bygone electronics era, where digital technology now rules the roost.  With the piece titled “Endgame,” Holdsworth jettison’s into a whirling-dervish like frenzy, to complement fluid support here and throughout by multi-instrumentalist Karl Jenkins.  To that end, it’s a worthy reissue and should be viewed upon as an essential acquisition for the group’s ardent admirers and for the younger jazz-rock/fusion dilettantes. 



Record Label Website: http://www.moonjunerecords.com

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Reviewed by: Glenn Astarita

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