Jaco Pastorius
Truth, Liberty & Soul
Resonance
ALMOST thirty years on from his tragically early death, Jaco Pastorius’ music on this handsomely packaged 2CD set sounds as alive and as current as if it had just been recorded.
Not only did the Floridian Pastorius revolutionise the bass guitar as a musical instrument, giving everything he played a human, singing voice as well as creating basslines of extraordinary intricacy and momentum, through his Word of Mouth orchestra he was moving the big band jazz tradition forward and introducing its excitement to new generations.
On the first album especially of this concert recorded in New York in 1982, much of it previously unreleased, the enlarged Word of Mouth band roars and dances as Pastorius leads the charge with astonishing – even now – musicality and unquenchable creative spirit.
The uptempo numbers are beyond exhilarating and with colleagues including steel pans virtuoso Othello Molineaux and the now sadly also departed Toots Thielemans on harmonica to hand, the more reflective passages are drenched in the advertised soul.
For all the personal problems that hastened his demise, Pastorius could call on the finest musicians available and harness their musicality with spectacular vision, as this recording abundantly confirms.
Rob Adams
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