HARRY BECKETT — Themes For Fega (review)

HARRY BECKETT — Themes For Fega album cover Live album · 1972 · Fusion Buy this album from MMA partners
3.5/5 ·
Sean Trane
For his third solo album, HB reproduced more or less the formula that made his first tw albums (Flare Up and Warm Smiles) artistic successes, by reconvening more or less the same line-up, this time with the return of saxman Alan Skidmore (he had missed WS). Again produced by Terry Brown, but recorded in Feb 72 in a different London studio, TFF was again released on the RCA label. Again, like in the previous Warm Smiles, all tracks are Beckett compositions, but in this case, the original release might have been a double-disc affair, by seeing the total track times.

Opening on dissonant trumpet squeals in the short Little One album intro, Spiral Feelings quickly digresses in an up-tempoed Bitches/Miles-like improv that gradually slows and become more melodic, but by the time it segues into Chandeliers And Mirrors, all hell had gone loose, only to slow down again soon after. A little later on, with the excellent Cry Of Triumph, a solid track that features a Spanish-tinged chorus and splendid flugelhorn solos of the same ilk, it might just be the album’s highlight. The short I’m Easy (not that much, really) is really a trampoline for the following 14-mins+ Enchanted, which opens on Laurence’s bass and Ricotti’s vibes, the whole thing veering in a fast hard bop-ish groove, with Taylor’s Rhodes taking a lengthy solo, first demolishing the rhythm then joining the suddenly-rebuilt theme, but in a much slower tempo. The 13-mins Everyone Is Me is definitely more modern jazz, but not necessarily more adventurous, even if the track goes totally dissonant and free for a minute or so in the middle section, but what to say about the closing (and thankfully short) Farewell Fega track. The last three tracks have bee n recorded live; BTW.

Like many early-70’s British jazz albums, TFF was unavailable in any kind of format for literally decades, until the always-subtle Vocalion Label (despite jazz not being their specialty) finally released it, coupled with the previous Warm Smiles on a 2on2 CD reissue in 06. I certainly wouldn’t call WS and TFF anything close to “twin-albums”, because if the personnel is almost the same, sonically they’re fairly different the much-longer latter album being more dissonant and less accessible for the standard jazz-head.

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