Emergency! (album)
| Emergency! | ||||
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| Studio album by The Tony Williams Lifetime | ||||
| Released | 1969 | |||
| Genre | Jazz fusion | |||
| Length | 70:24 | |||
| Label | Polydor, Polygram | |||
| Producer | Monte Kay, Jack Lewis | |||
| Tony Williams chronology | ||||
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Emergency! is the debut double album by American jazz fusion group The Tony Williams Lifetime. It was released in 1969 and was one of the first significant jazz fusion recordings.[1] The album has commonly been regarded as a pioneering, influential, and original album in the jazz, rock, and fusion genres.[2]
Contents
Background
Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found. On the album, the band experiments with a wide range of genres, including funk, psychedelic rock, hard bop, blues and free jazz. Williams can also be heard singing on the record, on the songs "Beyond Games", "Where", and "Via the Spectrum Road". It was during John McLaughlin's tenure with the band that Williams introduced the young guitarist to Miles Davis, who was conducting his own fusion explorations at the time. This introduction led to McLaughlin playing on some of Davis's most acclaimed and influential albums, including In a Silent Way, Bitches Brew and A Tribute to Jack Johnson. Davis had a particular influence on the band, as Williams had played in his Second Great Quintet with Wayne Shorter, Ron Carter, and Herbie Hancock, and Larry Young would go on to record on Bitches Brew.
Release and reception
| Professional ratings | |
|---|---|
| Review scores | |
| Source | Rating |
| AllMusic |  [3] |
| Chicago Tribune | [4] |
| The Penguin Guide to Jazz |  [5] |
| Record Collector | [6] |
| The Rolling Stone Album Guide | [7] |
| Sputnikmusic | 5/5[8] |
| The Village Voice | A[9] |
Emergency! was originally released in 1969 by Polydor Records and Polygram Records.[10] In a contemporary review for The Village Voice, music critic Robert Christgau called it a "stunner" and hailed Williams as "probably the best drummer in the world".[9] The album was later reissued on CD by Verve Records and Polygram in 1997.[10]
According to J. D. Considine in The Rolling Stone Album Guide (1992), jazz fusion started on Emergency! where McLaughlin was first given the chance to combine jazz and rock.[7] In a retrospective review for AllMusic, Leo Stanley said that it "shattered the boundaries between jazz and rock" with its "dense, adventurous, unpredictable soundscapes".[3] Dennis Polkow of the Chicago Tribune wrote that in spite of the album's questionable sound quality, the music has an "energy and spirit" that has never been surpassed in fusion.[4]
Track listing
- Side one
- "Emergency" (Williams) – 9:37
- "Beyond Games" (Williams) – 8:19
- Side two
- "Where" (McLaughlin) – 12:11
- "Vashkar" (Carla Bley) – 5:01
- Side three
- "Via the Spectrum Road" (McLaughlin, Williams) – 7:51
- "Spectrum" (McLaughlin) – 8:52
- Side four
- "Sangria for Three" (Williams) – 13:08
- "Something Spiritual" (Dave Herman) – 5:40
Personnel
The Tony Williams Lifetime
Production
- Elaine Gongora – Cover Design
- James Isaacs – Liner Notes
- Monte Kay – Producer
- Jack Lewis – Producer
- Sid Maurer – Art Direction, Photography
- Joseph M. Palmaccio – Digital Mastering, Editing
- Gene Radice – Engineer, Mixing
- Paul Ramey – Reissue Producer
- Phil Schaap – Liner Notes, Remastering, Restoration
- Richard Seidel – Reissue Producer
References
- ↑ The Tony Williams Lifetime: Emergency!
- ↑ "Miles and His Disciples"
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 Stanley, Leo. Emergency! at AllMusic
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Further reading
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External links
- Emergency! at Discogs (list of releases)
