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1-1 Hymn Of The Seventh Galaxy 3:31
1-2 After The Cosmic Rain 8:27
1-3 Captain Senor Mouse 9:02
1-4 Theme To The Mothership 8:48
1-5 Space Circus (Part I & II) 5:43
1-6 The Game Maker 6:49
1-7 Vulcan Worlds 7:52
1-8 The Shadow Of Lo 7:33
1-9 Beyond The Seventh Galaxy 3:15
1-10 Song To The Pharoah Kings 14:25
2-1 Dayride 3:28
2-2 Sofistifunk 3:52
2-3 No Mystery 6:12
2-4 Celebration Suite (Part I & II) 14:01
2-5 Medieval Overture 5:17
2-6 Sorceress 7:37
2-7 The Romantic Warrior 10:51
2-8 Majestic Dance 5:04
2-9 The Magician 5:30
2-10 Duel Of The Jester & The Tyrant (Part I & II) 11:29
Bass, Producer – Stanley Clarke
Drums – Lenny White
Guitar – Al Di Meola, Bill Connors
Keyboards, Piano, Producer – Chick Corea
Tracks 1-1 to 1-6 taken from the album Return To Forever Featuring Chick Corea - Hymn Of The Seventh Galaxy
Tracks 1-7 to 1-10 taken from the album Return To Forever Featuring Chick Corea - Where Have I Known You Before
Tracks 2-1 to 2-4 taken from the album Return To Forever Featuring Chick Corea - No Mystery
Tracks 2-5 to 2-10 taken from the album Return To Forever - Romantic Warrior
This IS the definitive Collection.
A brand new two cd anthology of the seminal classic jazz-rock fusion band. Features essential music from their chart-topping albums "Hymn of the Seventh Galaxy," "Where Have I Known You Before," "No Mystery," and "Romantic Warrior".
* Completely Remixed & Remastered.
* Best of the 4 classic albums together for the first time.
* Commemorates RTF's 2008 World Tour - Their first in 25 years featuring the iconic lineup of CHICK COREA, STANLEY CLARKE, AL DiMEOLA, and LENNY WHITE.
This summer Return To Forever, Chick Corea (keyboards), Stanley Clarke (bass), Lenny White (drums) and Al Di Meola (guitar), reunite for an unprecedented return to the concert stage after more than 25 years apart. To commemorate the World Tour 2008 they have personally selected and overseen the careful remixing and remastering of their ground-breaking repertoire.
Selected out of their virtual explosion of creativity the band culls tunes from their classic albums Hymn of the Seventh Galaxy (1973), Where Have I Known You Before (1974), the Grammy-winning No Mystery (1975) and their top-selling gold record Romantic Warrior (1976) - 20 tracks that propelled the band into history and made them a titanic influence on an entire generation of players. Free-form FM radio of the 70's played these tunes alongside rock peers Yes, King Crimson and Genesis and other burgeoning jazz crossovers like Headhunters and Mahavisnu Orchestra in a heady aural stew of progressive jazz & rock.
Mick Guzauski, whom has a Grammy to his credit for Eric Clapton's Back Home and Latin Grammy's (Alejandro Sanz, Thalia), approached this with a sincere yet workmanlike esthetic taking the original master tapes right back down to the basics and building it all back up with studio tools certainly not available back then; most are considered cutting edge even in the present. Not a reinvention or reimagination - more a restoration of how the band really sounded before less-than perfect digital transfers and other vagaries of the industry's rapid transition to CD. You'll wonder if your stereo really wasn't that good back then - trust us, it was fine - no one has ever heard Return To Forever like this.
Truly, no one has ever held a collection such as this, uniting the Electric period from the vaults of two major labels (Sony & Universal) on a single must-have set. Nearly all the music from that startling and concussive Electric period is represented here, over two and a half hours of RTF-ness across the two discs. Highlights will be different for every fan though surely the frenetic "Hymn of the Seventh Galaxy" is on most people's list as well as Stanley's loping syncopated "Dayride", Lenny's funky radio hit "Sorceress" and Al's arena jazz-rock workout "Majestic Dance". Remember this band is comprised of four real leaders: gifted with huge chops and composers of melodic, challenging rhythms
Clearly, contemporary bands like Medeski, Martin and Wood, Rudder, Jacob Fred Jazz Odyssey, the Flecktones et al have felt the imprint of RTF's iconic canon. Even the hip hop contingent has found riffs for clever sampling and artists including Lupe Fiasco and Dr. Dre acknowledge the power of the group's grooves.
The packaging of this new collection is no less definitive than the music it exhibits.
Designed by Peter Gabriel's (Real World) Creative Director, Marc Bessant the comprehensive and personal nature of this release is displayed in its ample parts.
Never-before-seen photos of the band, individual recollections from each band member and a deeply honorific and entertaining narrative liner essay from Miles Davis reissue producer Grammy-winner Bob Belden all contribute to the top-notch treatment this collection exudes on every page (and every groove.)
There is a moment in a short clip (view at www.return2forever.com) where the band ensconced at famed Mad Hatter studios rips through a tune fueled by the stomp funk bedrock of Stanley & Lenny, ignited by Chick's analog keyboards and gem-cutting flurries from Al's beautiful inlaid wood guitar and you can't imagine it's been 25 years plus. It's as though they just stepped out for a cup of coffee (albeit a long one) came back in and (jazz) rocked out again. A brief reunion in 1982 set a seed in the collective field for this reassembly of talents whom now, almost organically find it the right time to play together again. Long-time fans and new converts should also take heart that the ready for prime time again RTF is already talking about new material and recording as well as DVD projects and continued touring.
This collection will relight the fires of the loyalists and find new cachet in the hip, musical youth of the jam generation.
Return to Forever
Active Decade: '70s
Born: 1971
Died: 1979
Genre: Jazz
Styles: Fusion, Post-Bop
Return to Forever were jazz keyboard player Chick Corea's jazz-rock fusion band of the 1970s. Like Weather Report and the Mahavishnu Orchestra, it was a group formed by an alumnus of Miles Davis' late-'60s bands with the intention of furthering the jazz-rock hybrid Davis had explored on albums like Bitches Brew. At the time, this was seen as a means of creativity, a new direction for jazz, and as a way of attracting the kinds of large audiences enjoyed by rock musicians. Return to Forever started out as more of a Latin-tinged jazz ensemble, but Corea, influenced by the Mahavishnu Orchestra of John McLaughlin and some of the progressive rock bands coming out of Great Britain, notably Yes and Emerson, Lake & Palmer, moved the group more toward rock, achieving considerable commercial success. A later re-orientation of the band gave it more of a big band style before Corea folded the unit, retaining the Return to Forever name for occasional other projects.
Corea formed Return to Forever in the fall of 1971 while he was working in Stan Getz's band, and the two groups shared some members. In addition to Corea on keyboards, the initial lineup featured Stanley Clarke on bass, Joe Farrell on reeds, and the Brazilian husband-and-wife team of percussionist Airto Moreira and singer Flora Purim. "Return to Forever" was the name of the first tune Corea wrote for the outfit, and he then adapted it as the group's name. The band made its debut at the Village Vanguard nightclub in New York City in November 1971. In February 1972, they recorded their first self-titled album, though it was not released on ECM in Europe until the following year and did not appear in the U.S. until 1975. Corea, Clarke, and Moreira, all of whom had been playing with Getz, left his band to concentrate on Return to Forever.
The band toured Japan and recorded a second album, Light as a Feather, in London, using some of the songs Corea had written and recorded with Getz, such as "500 Miles High" and "Spain." It was released on Polydor Records. Up to this point, Return to Forever was more notable for its Latin sound than for fusion, but when Farrell left in the spring of 1973, Corea replaced him with a rock guitarist, Bill Connors from Spiral Staircase. Moreira and Purim also left to form their own group, and Corea brought in drummer Steve Gadd and percussionist Mingo Lewis, unveiling the new lineup at the New York City nightclub the Bitter End in April. They then cut a new album, but when it became apparent that Gadd, a successful session musician, wasn't interested in touring, Corea replaced him with Lenny White of the rock band Azteca, who changed the sound sufficiently that the band went back into the studio in August 1973 and recut the album, which was released in October under the title Hymn of the Seventh Galaxy. Here, Return to Forever turned decisively toward progressive rock and fusion, with Corea employing an extensive set of synthesizers. The result was crossover commercial success; the album spent several months in the pop charts.
In 1974, Connors left the group and was replaced initially by Earl Klugh, though only for a tour. The permanent replacement was 19-year-old Al di Meola, who left the Berklee School of Music to join the band. That summer, Return to Forever recorded its fourth album, Where Have I Known You Before, which was released in September. Backed by an extensive tour that ran through December and closed at Carnegie Hall, the album reached the pop Top 40 and remained in the charts more than five months. The band went back into the studio in January 1975 and quickly cut its fifth album, No Mystery, which was released in February. It too made the Top 40, though it charted for only three months. It also won the 1975 Grammy Award for Best Jazz Performance by a Group. Corea signed Return to Forever to Columbia Records, while remaining at Polydor as a solo artist. Romantic Warrior, a concept album on medieval themes, was the first Return to Forever album not to be co-billed to Corea on the original LP. Released in March 1976, it became the band's third consecutive Top 40 hit and went on to become its biggest seller, eventually earning a gold record. But with its completion, Corea again changed stylistic direction and disbanded the lineup.
Retaining Clarke as always, Corea immediately re-formed Return to Forever, adding his wife, Gayle Moran, formerly of the Mahavishnu Orchestra, on vocals and keyboards, returning member Joe Farrell, and drummer Gerry Brown, along with a horn section consisting of trumpeters John Thomas and James Tinsley, and trombonists Jim Pugh and Harold Garrett. With this personnel, Return to Forever recorded their seventh album, Musicmagic, which was released in March 1977. It became the band's fourth consecutive Top 40 album, spending more than four months in the charts. A third trombonist, Ron Moss, was added for the tour. On May 20-21, 1977, Return to Forever recorded a live album at the Palladium Theater in New York City, but Corea disbanded the group permanently after the tour. Live was released in February 1979, when it spent a month in the charts. (This was the single LP version; the show was also released as a triple LP, Live: The Complete Concert, which was later reissued as a double CD, Live.) In 1983, Corea reassembled Clarke, di Meola, and White for a tour.
Return to Forever ultimately came to be viewed as a chapter in the career of Chick Corea, who was sometimes given sole credit on CD reissues of its albums. In its time, it rose and fell according to the popular and critical response to jazz fusion in general, gaining accolades and healthy sales early on, but suffering from the backlash that all progressive jazz endured after the 1970s, when musical trends turned conservative and the remnants of jazz-rock mutated into smooth contemporary jazz. Also, it has fallen between stools in terms of music criticism, with hidebound jazz critics dismissing it as too much like rock music, while rock critics think of it as a jazz group. As such, there is a tendency to undervalue the band's real musical accomplishments, which, however, remain available to be heard on the records. After 25 years, Return to Forever reunited again for a tour of North America and Europe that began in Austin, TX, on May 29, 2008. Corea, Clarke, di Meola, and White scheduled approximately 50 dates through August 7.
---William Ruhlmann, All Music Guide |
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