ASPECTS - Larry Coryell
by DiamondDog on Sunday 21 May 2006

Larry Coryell - electric and acoustic guitar; Terumasa Huno - trumpet; Mike Mandel - keyboards; John Lee - bass; Gerry Brown - drums; House guests: Mtume - percussion; Danny Toan - guitar; Steve Khan - acoustic guitar; Michael Brecker - tenor saxophone; Randy Brecker - trumpet; David Sanborn - alto saxophone



Tracks

01 Kowloon Jag
02 Titus
03 Pyramids
04 Rodrigo Reflections
05 Yin-Yang
06 Woman of Truth and Dare
07 Ain't It Is
08 Aspects


ASPECTS was released in 1976. It was the Eleventh House featured Larry Coryell. Strangely it was without housedrummer Alphonse Mouzon. No reason given here.

The album starts with the funky Phaser guitar intro of Larry Coryell. Kowloon Jag sounds like a typical Eleventh House tune with a lot of funky drumbreaks, distorted trumpets here. Larry does give a good solo. Maybe his best on this album.
Titus is funky discotrack with a supporting horn section on the background. A little bit dull.
Pyramids sounds almost the same like Titus with the only exception with the disco-bridge. You can even hear the mistake of drummer Gerry Brown on this track. That's a sign of loss of magic of the Eleventh House.
Rodrigo Reflections is an acoustic guitar performance with some percussions on the background. Very earthy and folky. But it is a beautiful performance by Larry Coryell.
Woman of Truth and Dare is a beautiful midtempo song with a taste of Weather Report here. The melody is soft smoothen and really soulful. Mike Mandel gives a beautiful solo on his synthesizer.
Ain't It Is is a funky song with Larry on a groovy wah wah and on the background a soft Clavinet sound and a horn section. I must say that Larry's soloing isn't very spectacular here.
Aspects starts very hard with Larry on guitar. It has the same guitarsound like The Jam With Albert. The percussions adds a lot of excitement. Thanks to James Mtume as the percussionist. Aspects is uptempo and it is carried by Larry Coryell. Gerry Brown tries to give it a funky twist, but it's too limited, unfortunately.

ASPECTS isn't a good album at all. The band has lost the right and powerful feeling on this album. It's overwritten by meaningless funk and discobeats here and there. Some of the musicians here are limited and they can't present the hard driven feelings of the Eleventh House. Larry Coryell isn't on his best on this album. You can hear it on some of the tracks. Some of the songs you might wanna skip because of the repeating feel or sound. The only songs which are worth listening are Kowloon Jag and Rodrigo Reflections. This album is funky, but you can get better with other albums.




Rating:

40%