Album Discussion: RTF - "Light As A Feather"

The album was not my favorite, but the tour concert in support of the album was excellent.

I've never heard MusicMagic before. So many bad reviews for it put me off, so I never tried. It's on Spotify, so I guess I have no excuse now...

Light As A Feather is just a warm album. The debut sounds a little cold to me. Still awesome, and progressive in how it fuses jazz-rock with latin jazz.

snobb wrote: I really like this album as well, but "Return To Forever" sounds as original one for me, "Light As A Feather" is more a successful copy. These two albums are absolute peak of all RTF project for me (and probably best or between few best Corea's albums ever).  Some classic compositions were played later million times by Corea himself and some other collaborators (500 Miles High after few years was recorded by Flora Purim on her solo album), but never sounded better or even so good as here.

I also prefer the ECM "debut" better than this one...

I really like this album as well, but "Return To Forever" sounds as original one for me, "Light As A Feather" is more a successful copy. These two albums are absolute peak of all RTF project for me (and probably best or between few best Corea's albums ever). 

Edited by snobb - 05 Feb 2013 at 12:36am

Sorry I haven't been really been keeping up with this series (do most of you care anyway?  I'll keep it going though, even though I expected a lot more discussion on Birth of the Cool; maybe it's been talked about enough?)

Anyway, next album up is Return To Forever - "Light As A Feather"


In my opinion, this album is one of the best examples of really great Rhodes piano from the 1970s. There's something deep and percussive about Chick's tone here. He never got that sound quite right ever again, at least as far as the Rhodes piano. Some nice mix of jazz and Latin rhythms, similar to the previous album if you consider this RTF's second album (I do). Some female vocals on a few of the tunes, and while it took me some time to get over them when I was new to this album, they don't really detract from the overall experience, as the mood of the album is calm and introspective, but light cheery, like listening to this on a warm, sunny Spring day with not a cloud in the sky, in the middle of a beautiful field surrounded by trees. Classic Chick Corea tunes like Spain, 500 Miles High, and Captain Marvel, which later incarnations of the band would play live, are on this album. Never knew why I liked this one more than "Return To Forever" the album, but I do.

I use the first track, Move, as a wake-up song. It works great :)

Next up, Miles Davis' "Birth of the Cool"

Sean Trane wrote:     Abraxas wrote: I just think that Jan Hammer wasn't a really good choice for keyboards, Max Middleton's, on other hand, offered really funky clavinet and Rhodes, while Hammer has his particular synths that don't suit for me with Jeff's music.   Middleton worked with Beck in the  earlier 70's (71-74), where the keyboards srtill had that "good ol' vintage" sound we all love...   Hammer occupied Beck's kb stool in the later 70's with a very different set of synths, that simply do not please me as much as the previous generation... But it's not just Hammer that was prone to that... Zawie, Chick and many others used the uptodate KB in those years...

I think I prefer Blow by Blow, as a whole. I think that all the tunes in there are memorable, while Wired some stuff is rather forgetful. In Blow by Blow the funk groove is everywhere and Jeff is always leading with original guitar.

Edited by Abraxas - 05 Oct 2012 at 1:44pm

Next up is: Jeff Beck - "Wired"