Jazz
Progressive Bluegrass
Fusion
Bela Fleck & The Flecktones
Bela Fleck (banjo); Howard Levy (harmonica); Victor Wooten (bass); Roy Wooten (percussion)
After disbanding New Grass Revival, Bela Fleck began re-creating the role of the banjo in the same way Charlie Parker redefined the role of the saxophone. But Fleck may be the least-innovative member of this quartet: Howard Levy gets chromatics from his blues harp, Victor Wooten picks banjo rolls on his bass, and Roy "Future Man" Wooten plays a Frankenstein-monster drum-machine/guitar synthesizer. For all the flash, there's little pretense; the group's astonishing musicianship keeps an "aw-shucks" accessibility that lets everybody follow the melody while they marvel.
---Brian Mansfield, allmusic |
