Very Vital Information

It's 2003, I'm sitting in Blues Alley in Georgetown, DC with my two sons aged 17 and 15. The elder son is a young guitarist, having already absorbed what I could teach him and currently enrolled in lessons with a sweep picker in the Richmond, VA area. The younger son is an aspiring drummer, also in lessons, a rock player whom I convinced to come see this thing called 'fusion'. Both are about to receive master class lessons from Messieurs Gambale and Smith.

We've snagged a table right in front of the guitar rig. Marshall rack mounted preamp, TC Electronics G Force effects processor, pair of two twelve speaker cabinets, power amp and a bar stool. Blues Alley is a great club where you order dinner before the band comes on, so we choose some of the Cajun specialties and try to make sure not to spill anything on Mr. G's gear.

The band members step out to take their places, water bottles in hand. Frank sits down at the bar stool, his black Yamaha AES signature guitar with the bent-fret 'wave' system draped over him. He's looking for a place to set his water bottle. "OK if I put this here?" Frank says as he motions to our table. We stumble all over ourselves, "of course", "absolutely", "yes sir". The bottle rests on the checkerboard tablecloth and a last minute tune up ensues.

Baron Browne is last to the stage, throwing off his coat and hastily unloading the gig bag off his shoulder. A deceptively simple bass groove begins, and four, three, two, one - they're off. Tom Coster's Hammond B-3 organ floods the small club's brick walls with warm old school chord work. Frank comps along effortlessly, the solos coming with such a small amount of finger movement, it makes no visual sense against the river of notes that are pouring out. That is the power of sweeping. Steve Smith delivers a clinic on the use of the traditional grip on the high hat and snare, and serves as our MC for the evening. With a casual sense of humour and at the same time a seriousness about the music, Steve guides us through the tunes like we were sitting in his living room. It is evident these guys know each other well and enjoy each other's musical company.

Vital Information is doing two shows this nite. The encore is over, and we must leave. My sons and myself walk out of the small club and see the line waiting for the second show, extending down the full length of the alley onto the street. We know what these people are in for. Walking out onto the bustling streets of Georgetown, still high off the calibre of the performance, it feels like we are in another place. My younger son suddenly remarks, "we just saw the best musicians in the world". I couldn't have said it better.

Get Vital Information's double live CD : www.vitalinformation.com/vital/live

Zawinul Zen

In 2006 The Zawinul Syndicate came to Blues Alley in Washington DC. Blues Alley is located litterally in an alley in Georgetown, a wonderful old school jazz club that can only hold about 75 people. Zawinul loved to play this intimate venue. What none of us knew was that Joe would pass away the next year.

I had recently bought Joe's double live CD 'Vienna Nights', which had been recorded in his club Birdland in Austria. After all the success of Weather Report and all the fantastic musicians that have passed through the Zawinul tutelage, I read that Joe felt this current band's rhythm section had more groove than any band he'd ever had. What? More groove than Pastorious, Erskine, Bailey, Hakim? After getting the CD, I found out I couldn't call Zawinul a shameless promoter of his latest record - Linely Marthe on bass and Karim Ziad on drums absolutely kill on this record. So when I heard Zawinul Syndicate was coming to DC, my bass player buddy and myself got there early, to nab that front row table about five feet from the stage.

Being a guitarist, I was always surprised how much I liked this keyboard player. Joe had long ago decided not to allow himself to repeat anything when improvising, and it kept him relevant. You also would never hear any thin or cheesy keyboard patches coming from his equipment. Always fat and warm, and his use of the vocorder made the music even warmer. The vocorder added the human voice, but in no discernible language. A melting pot of all languages. Joe was doing 'world music' before the term ever existed.

Back to Blues Alley. The show was fantastic. Sitting three feet in front of Linley Marthe during his bass solo is a musical experience you won't forget. All the while Maestro Joe is orchestrating the band, leading his pupils with simple winks and nods.

After the show, my buddy and I went upstairs, pretending to wait for the bathrooms. We knew the band's dressing room was up there, and sure enough, the door was slightly open. With a copy of 'Vienna Nights' and a sharpie marker held out, my buddy pushed the door slightly. Zawinul sees the CD and motions for us to come on in. The room must be only six by eight feet in size, it's just the band and us. Wow. Joe is sitting upright in the corner, on a counter with full mirrors behind him. Like a guru, reflecting images of himself.

"What's your name" he says, and signs my CD cover with the hands that have played all those great tunes. At 74 years, still an emissary of fusion. Priceless.

Get to know Joe personally with this great DVD:
Joe Zawinul: A Musical Portrait

Thank you Shawn Lane

In 1994 Shawn Lane and Jonas Hellborg first collaborated and recorded the album 'Abstract Logic'. It wouldn't be until 2004 that I would be in a used CD store in Blacksburg Virginia, thumbing through prospective purchases, and would decide to take a risk on this guitar player I had vaguely heard about.

The owner of my local music store in Richmond, Virginia said Shawn Lane was his favorite guitar player. He was a drummer that I respected, and that got me curious. I had played guitar for 30 years, considered myself an informed fusion-head, but I didn't know this Shawn Lane guy. The guys at the music store had gone to see Shawn at one of his later concerts in Northern Virginia, and told the story of getting there early to meet Shawn personally, only to walk in on him while he hurriedly tried to conceal a joint he was smoking. Who was this reclusive genius?

Driving down the road last week, listening to the track 'Serpents and Pigs', it occurred to me that the guitar solo on this song was a perfect microcosm of my own discovery of Shawn. In 2004 I had bought the CD on a whim, begun the drive out of Blacksburg, and was listening to 'Serpents and Pigs', the first track. Fairly conventional music as fusion goes, I thought. Solid playing, maybe a little too much delay and reverb, but decent. OK, here comes the guitar solo. Hellborg buckles down to a simple driving bass line, and Shawn begins building what seems to be a pretty standard southern rock guitar response. Tasty and well done, but standard. That pentatonic mode that is all too familiar to me, a curse of my own playing. Then at the 2:15 point, my brain is hijacked. A single note outside of the pentatonic mode transforms the song and takes me to India. There it is, something new I haven't heard before. Then suddenly the pattern is effortlessly accelerated to twice the speed. Amazing. Completely clean and accurate. The solo completes with blazing quadruplets up the guitar neck. I was hooked.

Having since listened to as much of Shawn's music as I can find, what I've discovered is that yes, the speed and ability of this guitarist is astounding, but Shawn's sense of melody and his note selection is the best I've heard of any guitarist in fusion. Listen to 'Deep Umbra' off of Michael Shrieve's 'Two Doors' CD. The guitar solo is sublime, perfect. Shawn always had something to say, something fresh and different from all the other guitar cliche that is out there. Thank you Shawn Lane.

Buy Shawn's music here: http://www.abstractlogix.com

The Lane family's official website: http://www.shawnlane.com/