Birds Of Fire [Remastered] - Mahavishnu Orchestra

This is arguably the best album of its kind. If you have never tried anything that falls into the Jazz-rock/Fusion category from the 70's then this is where I suggest you start.

Not only are there 10 tracks which average less than 5 minutes each, there is also no time for long meandering and irrelevant soloing or ego-led self indulgence. The whole album is riff driven and a supreme example of concise and meaningful guitar playing but ...
...excluded. At times the interchange between guitar, violin and keyboards is exquisite, eg Terrestrial Celestial Commuters and throughout the drumming of Billy Cobham fairly propels the whole thing along. Generally speaking the playing is flawless but still has soul and life and not a few tunes or different moods.

If you are still not convinced and fancy yourself as a conoisseur of guitarists, just try the title track - I once played ... more

This is arguably the best album of its kind. If you have never tried anything that falls into the Jazz-rock/Fusion category from the 70's then this is where I suggest you start.

Not only are there 10 tracks which average less than 5 minutes each, there is also no time for long meandering and irrelevant soloing or ego-led self indulgence. The whole album is riff driven and a supreme example of concise and meaningful guitar playing but not to the extent that the other two soloists are excluded. At times the interchange between guitar, violin and keyboards is exquisite, eg Terrestrial Celestial Commuters and throughout the drumming of Billy Cobham fairly propels the whole thing along. Generally speaking the playing is flawless but still has soul and life and not a few tunes or different moods.

If you are still not convinced and fancy yourself as a conoisseur of guitarists, just try the title track - I once played this to a friend who literally cowered on the sofa at the slicing power of John Mclaughlin's playing. Overall this album is not just jazz playing but also out and out rock which avoids the discordance and bloodyminded quirkiness that puts so many people off from listening to this kind of music.

If you fancy blowing a few musical cobwebs out of your life then just try the opening 10 minutes of this album - it might even get you into Miles Davis!!!! 

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