Search - Comotion :: Head West

HEADING WEST

veganbrother | colorado | 12/06/2000

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Head West features the individualistic and immediately recognizeable presence of musical virtuosos Darol Anger on Violins (Newgrange, Anger-Marshall Band) Mike Kang (The String Cheese Incident) on electric and acoustic mandolins, Mike Marshall(David Grisman Quartet, Anger-Marshall Band) on steel and nylon string guitars, cello guitar, and ouditar, Paul McCandless(Paul Winter Consort, Oregon) on saxophones, obe, and bass clarinet, Tye North(Leftover Salmon) on electric bass, Jeff Sipe a.k.a. Apt Q-258(Leftover Salmon, Aquarium Rescue Unit) on drums and Aaron Johnston on drums and percussion. Head West offers a buoyant and intricate musical interplay and a deft melding of genres and world rythms. While combining musical styles such as bluegrass, jazz, celtic, and more, the technical mastery of each musician and the exceptional creativity of the collaboration results in an album that excludes an incomparrable uplifting and tranquil energy. Each participating musician has created a musical life that reaches far and wide. Comotion is a project that continues to expand boundaries both individually and collectively."

Just a little disappointing

03/19/2001

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Wow, how could this disk go wrong? Take 3 veterans of acoustic music (anger, marshall & mccandless) & combine them with some of the best of the current edition of progressive bluegrass/ jamgrass/ call it what you want & how can you go wrong? Well, you DON'T go wrong: this is a fine recording, by virtuoso musicians. But there IS something missing here. The resultant product is oft times too restrained, too controlled, too smooth, & too produced. There are exceptions, including marshall mcanger and a few other tracks. The playing is uniformly tasteful. But instead of a mix of some bluegrass, some salsa, some celtic, some rock, too often what could be wonderful melodies by fabulous musicians get whitewashed with the same broad brush that tries to mix them all, & leaves you with nothing of the best of any of them. Fans of SCI, Darol Anger, Mike Marshall, & LOS will surely want to have this disk, & will be glad they got it. I am. This may be a case of outsized expectations, just based on the band's lineup."

TASTY, BUT NO CIGAR

Joseph A. Kengor | Youngstown, OH USA | 06/13/2001

(3 out of 5 stars)

"I knew I was taking a chance when I bought this release. There always is a percentage of risk when buying a first release by a group of talented soloists. What we have here is a grass/celtic/ jazz/???? FUSION which has many moments of inspired playing by the cast, BUT, the FUSION takes the overall sound so far away from the traditions of any of the influences, that the sounds they make just seem to hang out in space, ungrounded so to speak. Perhaps, they've tried to blend so many styles, that it all becomes so much NEW AGE noodling and lick flinging. Then there are the annoying sound effects... not many, but inter- spersed here and there are... first track-muted wah wah guitar, later on, there's the vocoder thing, you know, the guitar player has this flexible hose in his mouth that the guitar sound goes into his mouth- yeah, that thing. Mike Marshall probably doesn't get to use these effects playing new grass stuff, but it just does not seem to fit. There are just too many ingredients in this stew; there is little that I would call meaningful. Miles Davis played FUSION that was meaningful. So did John McLaughlin. This stuff sounds great, carries little weight. I will see this group LIVE in the next week or so, and I promise to report back my findings."