May 16, 2012

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With Living Colour currently off the road, guitarist Vernon Reid has assembled a jazz-rock/fusion supergroup called Spectrum Road; the group will release a self-titled LP on June 5th through Palmetto Records.

In addition to Reid, the band includes former Cream bassist-singer Jack Bruce, Medeski Martin and Wood keyboardist John Medeski and ex-Lenny Kravitz drummer (and Carlos Santana's wife) Cindy Blackman Santana.

"The germ of the idea started a really long time ago," Reid tells Rolling Stone. "It started when I was touring with Jack Bruce in Europe – this is in the shadow of 9/11. And somewhere in the middle of all of that, we were having a really good time . . . And I remember asking Jack about his life, about what Cream was like to Hendrix and about [jazz drummer] Tony Williams.

"The combination of rock and jazz...it was really Tony Williams who started this almost psychedelic kind of thing, with even more of a rock edge than what Miles Davis was doing at the time," Reid continues. "Jack joined him with the record Turn It Over, and they had a really hard time. The critics were not always kind to Tony. They would slag him as a vocalist. Looking back, the guy was a prophet. You hear the roots of a lot of alternative rock in what he was doing. The style of the singing – you hear the roots of Thom Yorke in some of his stuff. That just started the idea. I thought of Cindy Blackman, because I've done stuff with her, and I thought of John Medeski, because John is the man. And eight years later, we wound up doing it."

Spectrum Road's music reflects a vintage kind of fusion, but it also contains a few unexpected elements. "[It's] definitely a jazz-rock thing but it has a rock edge, because one of the architects of modern rock is in the band and he's singing these tunes," Reid says. "It's kind of an odd combination of jazz-rock as we know it. John Medeski is such an odd keyboardist and so quirky, and one of the beautiful things is his use of the Mellotron on the record, because the Mellotron is not associated with jazz-rock and fusion to a large degree. It's more associated with King Crimson, Yes and the Moody Blues. It gives the thing a different feel and sonic signature."

Reid also lists a few of the album's standout tracks. "'An t-Eilean Muileach' [which Bruce sings in Scottish Gaelic] would be one," he says. "Certainly 'There Comes a Time,' which is probably the best-known song off the record Ego [Williams' 1971 release]. I would say the song 'Where,' which features Cindy Blackman singing, and 'Blues for Tillmon' is a group-written composition and it's just this lovely straight-ahead blues."

The guitarist also gives an update regarding Living Colour. "Living Colour just got together a few weeks ago – preparing to do a bunch of writing in preparation to make a record for 2013," he says. "We want to be out and touring in 2013." That said, Reid plans on making Spectrum Road an ongoing project. "Everyone is insanely busy, but it feels so good when we're together and connecting that I really look forward to making the next record."

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[Edited 6/23/12 6:11am]

Music for adventurous listeners

tA

Tribal Records

Sounds great! i will listen to anything Vernon has a hand in.

Gunsnhalen said:

SavonOsco said:

Gunsnhalen said:

Sounds great! i will listen to anything Vernon has a hand in.

Ditto......

yay!

I mean it though..... if Vernon was to play guitar on an elmo how to potty album i would buy it the day it comes out

Spectrum Road featuring (left to right) John Medski, Reid, Cindy Blackman Santana and Jack Bruce.

[Edited 5/16/12 15:52pm]

Identity said:

Specrum Road featuring (left to right) John Medski, Reid, Cindy Blackman Santana and Jack Bruce.

I dig this lineup. Wassup Jack Bruce!

Timmy84 said:

Identity said:

Specrum Road featuring (left to right) John Medski, Reid, Cindy Blackman Santana and Jack Bruce.

I dig this lineup. Wassup Jack Bruce!

Cindy Blackman & Jack Bruce to? ima just go die now

Gunsnhalen said:

Timmy84 said:

I dig this lineup. Wassup Jack Bruce!

Cindy Blackman & Jack Bruce to? ima just go die now

Hold on and take a hit of oxygen, please. How cool is that though?

I saw this lineup last year, when it came through Seattle (and I accidentally smacked Carlos Santana with a door when he was waiting in the lobby to see his wife Cindy), and I have to say that I was really underwhelmed. I'm a HUGE Medeski fan, and he was barely featured. Cindy Blackman had no sense of subtlety on the drums...she kinda sounded like Animal from the Muppets. And Jack Bruce was off his game. Maybe it was a bad night...every band has them. But it wasn't impressive.

[img:$uid]http://i50.tinypic.com/f5cfbb.jpg[/img:$uid]

Availablity: June 12th

Track listing:

''Vuelta Abajo''
''There Comes A Time''
''Coming Back Home''
''Where''
''An t-Eilean Muileach''
''Vashkar''
''One Word''
''Blues for Tillmon''
''Allah Be Praised''
''Wild Life''

Hmm,

I can't say I would have been impressed by the clip the Audience linked here.

I like the Mistaken Identity album by him, but I think Vernon Reid's biggest problem as a musician is that he doesn't utilize pauses at all. That sound of his excessively distorted lead guitar is just constantly audible in the mix (unless there's a break in the composition itself). I really like the way he adds a touch of jazz to his shredding, but he's not very good at leaving space for other musicians.

Clean your fucking ears out! That was great stuff. If Prince did that you would be creaming in your jeans.

He does Purple Rain for the millionth time and you cry like a bird. Gosh.

I'm sorry, I just don't what I hear there by him is that good musicianship. Except for that break in the middle, there's not a single second where his guitar isn't audible. He doesn't stop fingering the fretboard for even a half a second. I don't need to clean my fucking ears out to hear that. His shredding is more interesting than the typical heavy metal guitarist's, but on cuts like that one it just gets annoying in the long run.

If you were to transcribe his playing there you couldn't use a single one of these:

As far Prince, he's started to show the same type of problems with his long solo sections during the last couple of years. At least those are just sections during the songs.

Gunsnhalen said:

Sounds great! i will listen to anything Vernon has a hand in.

I saw Vernon play at the Experience Hendrix show a couple of years ago. My husband and I were in the 2nd row directly in front of him and we were blown away at his amazing talent on the guitar. This new project definitely sounds like it could be worth a listen or two.

Audio samples:

http://www.amazon.com/Spe...B007G9OO4G

Cindy Blackman Santana Puts the Spin on Spectrum Road

June 23, 2012

Link

Cindy Blackman Santana is a drummer with few peers. Besides her decade-long stint with Lenny Kravitz, she has been working with the likes of Vernon Reid (Living Color) to create a new band that is part homage and part revival of the music of Tony WilliamsLifetime.

Adding legitimate weight to the project are bass icon Jack Bruce (ex-Cream) and keyboardist John Medeski, making this quartet not only a fusion hotbed but a forward-thinking, true group collaboration. I recently spoke to Cindy before the band’s first full US tour supporting their new album on the Palmetto label.

What are your impressions of how well the group is working live?

It’s really fun. Everybody’s really open to letting the music happen in the moment. We’re cognizant of the structure of the tune that we’re playing but we’re very open to letting the music go different directions and take on different form. Nobody in the band is jaded and that is a really beautiful thing. It lends itself to a lot of creativity and a lot of on-edge excitement. You know it’s like going to a movie and sitting on the edge of your seat the whole time. It’s a good situation for that.

My guitar playing friend Scott Steele and went to Seattle to see you guys play in January at the Jazz Alley and we noticed there’s a lot of unique chemistry happening there on stage.

Absolutely! Vernon has got a particular vibe as do Jack and John. And so together it’s like super energy.

When this band was forming did you contact John McLaughlin to be part of the band? Or was Vernon onboard before that happened?

I have another band which is called Another Lifetime which also plays some of this music and some different music. We play different couple of band originals. But Spectrum Road was actually initiated by Vernon. He called me and said, “Cindy, I’ve been thinking about doing a band project that’s a tribute to Lifetime and you’re the only drummer I could think of calling. Are you into it?” And I said, “Are you kidding? Of course I’m interested.”

It took it awhile for it to formulate. But he had been speaking with Jack Bruce and then again and then he was on board. And then Vernon called me at some other point and said, “I just spoke to John Medeski (Martin, Medeski and Wood) and he wants to be involved too. So that’s how the group kind of formed. But it’s a collaborative effort. I would say that there’s no one leader.

So you’re starting with the Tony Williams Lifetime material and trying to extend it even further?

Yes, and we want to do more original music and more new stuff; we want to add some different things. We want to use the music that we’ve built in terms of our repertoire for the Lifetime music. We want to use that as a springboard and play stuff of similar energy to do some really different takes on some of those songs and come up with a whole different sound. We’re geared towards doing that.

You recently finished sessions for your first album. Did the sessions go the way the way you expected? Can you pick a song that represents in your mind about how the sessions went?

I’d say most of the songs are pretty representative how well the sessions went except there was one original that we did in a different manner. But yeah we basically went and talked around the tunes, we played them once maybe twice and that was it! It went really quickly, we did it in an afternoon. Another song, “An T-Eilan Muileach” is an original recording stay and then we recorded me playing the pattern. Then I said, “You know, I’m going to put some drums over that to see what comes out. And then Vernon put some guitar over that. And then we both looked at each other said, “You know this would be a perfect vehicle for Jack to sing on ‘cos it sounds kinda Gaelic. He can do that kind of singing. Jack came in and put some vocal down; some bass down and John came in and put some keyboard stuff on it. We kind of built that one up which is how we did the song.

That was the only we did in that matter. Everything else was just played on the spot. And we did that song that way when we first together in the studio. That song is kind of indicative of the “whatever works” kind of approach because what worked at that moment was for us to build the song in that way.

Your self-titled album was recently released on Palmetto record and you’ve got a lot of gigs lined up too. You’re going to be doing Bonnaroo: that’s a big stage!

I have been wanting to play Bonnaroo for so long. The whole energy at that festival is indicative of a raw true- my favorite energy. So I cannot wait to connect with that.

Do you guys have any plans to film the band? That would not only be a great promotional vehicle but also a good way to document where you were at the time.

You know we haven’t actually talked about doing it, but I think that’s a good idea. I’d love to do that.

Can you tell me about your special relationship with Jack? It looks like you have some very cool fireworks going on rhythmically on the live stage. It seems like there’s a lot of mutual empathy for your style of playing.

Yes there’s a mutual thing there that’s respectful and loving too. I love Jack’s playing; I love what he’s doing. He’s not just a rock and roll musician he is very open and he’s totally into taking in the moment of where we are in the song. He’s not jaded into having to play things a certain way. At least once a set we just chose a spot in the set where just make up something. He’ll just start playing something and we’ll all just join in. then it will be John turn, then Jack’s then my turn.

We’ll all take a chance and we’ll have a kind of a round robin. That’s really creative and indicative of the kind of energy we want to have. When you’re creating on the spot that’s what jazz is -whatever the moment calls for. There’s a ton of that in this band and that is one of my favorite things.

Have you had to adapt your drumming style to play some of these songs?

No, because I know this music. I have been playing these songs way before I ever got involved in Spectrum Road or in my own band. I love this music so I was playing these songs way before that just because I love it. It had nothing to do with the gig, tour or record or anything. It’s the music that I breathe in.

novabrkr said:

I'm sorry, I just don't what I hear there by him is that good musicianship. Except for that break in the middle, there's not a single second where his guitar isn't audible. He doesn't stop fingering the fretboard for even a half a second. I don't need to clean my fucking ears out to hear that. His shredding is more interesting than the typical heavy metal guitarist's, but on cuts like that one it just gets annoying in the long run.

If you were to transcribe his playing there you couldn't use a single one of these:

As far Prince, he's started to show the same type of problems with his long solo sections during the last couple of years. At least those are just sections during the songs.

co-sign

just sounds like incoherent freaking out to me

[Edited 6/23/12 7:22am]