Hallelujah!
Christian McBride is not one of those strait-laced, down-the-line neo-boppers after all. Here, the prodigiously talented young standup bassist proves that he is also an astoundingly gifted electric bassist, and that '70s-vintage funk and soul are every bit as close to his heart as '50s and '60s hard bop. On electric,
McBride weaves inventive countermelodies around tenor sax
Tim Warfield's lead lines, taking
Jaco Pastorius' technique a step further in sheer speed and the ability to play really nasty funk patterns. The stylistic palette of the disc is much wider than anything
McBride has done before as a leader, ranging from soul ballads (a lovely cover of
Stevie Wonder's nearly forgotten "Summer Soft,"
Wonder-like vocals from
Vesta on "...Or So You Thought") to powerful funk ("Brown Funk [For Ray]"), open-ended electric jazz-rock ("Wayne's World"), and yes, straight-ahead acoustic jazz grooving (on Sly Stone's "Family Affair"). Charles Craig excels on acoustic piano, Fender Rhodes, and Wurlitzer electric pianos; drummer
Gregory Hutchinson fearlessly handles any stylistic curve balls that
McBride throws at him; and guitarist
Russell Malone and percussionist
Munyungo Jackson turn up now and then. As produced by fellow polystylist
George Duke, this is a most encouraging step out of the trap of lockstep bop for
McBride. ~ Richard S. Ginell