Baron says Thanx To the guys
at WILLOW ENTERTAINMENT (Boston),
and to Bob Gallien and Dan Elliott at
Gallien-Krueger Amps.
Big huge Thanx To Gail McArthur.
www.baronbrowne.com
Frank Gambale uses the YAMAHA AEX-1 500 Jazz Guitar,
YAMAHA AES-FG Electric Guitar,
YAMAHA FPX-300 Acoustic Guitar,
CARVIN TONE NAVIGATOR Preamp.
D'ADDARIO Strings.
SEYMOUR DUNCAN Pickups and SKB cases
Frank Gambale appears Courtesy of WOMBAT RECORDS
www.frankgambale.com
Tom Coster uses the KORG CX-3 and the KORG Triton Pro.
Tom Thanks his friends at KORG USA: Mr. Kato San.
Mike Kovins, Hugh Gilmartin, John McCubbery.
SKB: Dave Sanderson.
BAG END: Jim Wishmeyer and Mackie: Greg Mackie and D.K. Sweet,
APPLE: Jim Luther
www tomsgonefishing.com
Steve Smuh Thanks Mike Varney at TONE CENTER RECORDS for continuing to support jazz.
Janet Williamson for the hours of dedication booking the band, Bob Biles for recording and mixing us so well,
my friends at ZILDJIAN: Cragie and Debbie Zildjian.
John DeChristopher, Jim McGathy, Paul Francis, John King, and Bob Wiczlmg.
SONAR: Karl-Heinz Menzel, Milan Goltz, Jerry Goldenson, and Rusty Martin, Vic Firth Marco Soccoli, Vic and Tracy Firth,
REMO: Matt Connors and Bob Yerby,
DW PEDALS: Don Lombardi,
SHURE: Ryan Smith, Jeff Ocheltree for the fantastic Phantom Steel snare drums,
Michael Bloom for spreading the word,
Victor Salazar for all the help with our tours.
Wayne Saroyan for the Vital website, and Bryan Kilfoil for the groovy graphics !
Extra Special Thanks To you. Diane, for your open attitude, warm heart and unwavering support for the band and me.
www.vitalinformation.com/steve
Acknowledging his appearance on a string of five
mega-selling albums with arena rock kings Journey,
Columbia Records deigned to throw drummer Steve Smith a
bone back in 1983. What Smith did with that golden
opportunity was to record Vital Information, a hard-hitting
instrumental project that harkened back to his incendiary
late 70s work with fusion violinist Jean-Luc Ponty and
with guitarist Ronnie Montrose. He followed up that solo
release with a tour, a second record, Orion, and ... voila!...
a band was born.
"The history of that first record is that I had known
the bass player, Tim Landers, and the sax player, David | Wilczewski,
since high school." recalls Smith. "We played together in 71 and 72 in the Bridgewater State College
big band in Massachusetts. The three of us were actually
high school students from different schools that they
brought in because they didn't have enough players in
the college big band. We met then and continued to play through the years.
Even during the time when I was
playing with Jean-Luc Ponty, Ronnie Montrose or Journey,
and Tim was playing with Al Di Meola and Dave was with Al Kooper,
we still got together once a year and played
gigs in Boston. Eventually, by '83, I was able to get a
record deal on Columbia. That's when I came up with the
Vital Information name and we did our first record with
Mike Stern and Dean Brown on guitars, both were old friends from the Berklee College of Music. So basically
Vital Information was just a bunch of friends getting
together and having a good time making a real record on
a major label. And it just kept going from there.
I wanted to keep the band going as an outlet for whatever I was
interested in musically and creatively, and to play with the
people that I really wanted to play with."
Now in its 21 st year since that initial release.
Vital Information has become a formidable fusion juggernaut
whose longevity surpasses the Zawinul Syndicate,
Tribal Tech and even Weather Report. With various personnel
changes over the years, (bassist Kai Eckhardt played on
1988s Fiafiaga, acoustic bassist Larry Grenadier and
saxophonist Larry Schneider played on 1990s Vitalive!,
electric bassist Jeff Andrews joined in '92 on Easier Done Than I Said).
Vital Information continued to evolve while refining
it's distinctive sound. As Smith points out, "It was a little
more rock and fusion oriented at the beginning and then
it went through a phase where we were doing things
on the computer, which reflected a lot of what was going on
at the time in the late '80s. Keyboardist Tom Coster joined
the group on Global Beat in '86 and guitarist
Frank Gambale started with us in '88 on Fiafiaga.
In the early '90s we stopped using the sax and later we reinvented
ourselves with a more organic approach of featuring Tom on the Hammond B-3
and Frank on the jazz-box guitar and by going after the looser/funkier U.S. Beat vibe."
That new direction came in with 1998s Where
We Come From, a rootsy amalgam which ran the stylistic
gamut from James Brown funk to Booker T & The MGs Memphis soul
to searing Tony Williams Lifetime-inspired
fusion while making further allusions to jazz icons like
Buddy Rich. Jimmy Smith. Wes Montgomery and Ornette Coleman
along the way. That Americanized formula
became more clarified on 2000's Live Around The World,
which introduced electric bassist and longtime Jean-Luc Ponty
sideman Baron Browne to the Vital lineup.
Their group chemistry solidified on 2001 s Show 'Em Where You Live.
On the band's 11 th album. Come On In. Vital Information
continues to hone its "American music" direction
while staking out some adventurous new territory.
With this third Vital Information recording to showcase the ongoing
lineup of Smith, Coster. Gambale and Browne,
the listener is invited to a veritable banquet of sounds
to satisfy a wide variety of tastes. From slamming funk and
syncopated second line grooves to seriously swinging,
uptempo B-3 burners. South Indian Carnatic inspired
jams and sizzling fuzoid romps, these seasoned veterans
cover a lot of bases on Come On In and do it all in such
convincing fashion.
Vital founder Smith is quick to point out that a key
to the band's remarkable versatility is its bassist.
"Baron brought a real serious groove element to the band,"
says Smith of his rhythm section partner.
"He's my favorite bass player to play with because he can play
all the styles and he always makes the music feel so good.
Baron plays great swing, great funk and groove, he can read anything
and play in all the odd time signatures and he can play over changes really well.
It's hard to find bass players who can do all of that, so he really matches up with me well."
Opening on a decidedly jazz note with "Tunnel Vision",
paced by Smith's briskly swinging stickwork and
Gambales's brilliant guitar playing, the highly flexible
unit moves easily and authoritatively to Tom Coster's
kinetic title cut. With Steve's steady hi hat pulse and
the tricky unison figures between Gambale's guitar and
Browne's electric bass, this bass feature is reminiscent of
Jaco Pastorius' chops-busting anthem Teen Town".
On the freewheeling acoustic trio improvisation "Beneath The Surface",
Smith eschews the traps set here for
the African clay pot Udu drum, setting up a groove
underneath Coster's accordion and Gambale's steel string
acoustic guitar. That organic jam serves as an intro to the
pumped-up, electrified funk-fusion offering "Cat Walk",
which features ripping solos by Coster on B-3 and Gambale
on clean-toned guitar wailing over a 7/8 groove.
"Around The World" bears the stamp of New Orleans'
premier ambassadors of funk. The Meters. Note how
Browne's slippery yet deeply-rooted basslines here form a
moving grooving pocket with Smith's convincing second
line beat - in 9/4 - capturing that inimitable push-and-pull
feel that marked so many of The Meters' '60s and
70s hits, courtesy of the great rhythm tandem of bassist
George Porter and drummer Zigaboo Modeliste.
On top of that earthy pocket. Coster layers on Man-Child-era
Herbie Hancock-isms on synth while Gambale unleashes
more of his fiery ftetboard work, culminating in some
exhilarating arpeggiated exchanges with Coster, at the
tag of this infectious groover.
Gambales "Soho" is a suitable showcase for his peerles
chops. A swinging midtempo vehicle, it reveals the
Aussie guitar hero's undying love of Wes Montgomery
while also highlighting his patented (and mind-boggling}
sweep picking technique. Gambale also reveals
his fondness for blowing effortlessly over blues form at
breakneck tempos on his smoking jazz number "A Little Somthing".
Smith's agile brushwork in tandem with
Browne's insistent walking basslines provides a swinging
foundation for this surging hard bop number.
The sparks really fly during Ņoster's burning, Jimmy Smith-inspired
B-3 solo while Gambale ups the ante with another
awesome solo that culminates in a daring guitar-drums
breakdown between Gambale and Smith.
The two have been developing there obviously musical rapport in
Vital Information since 1988 and have further forged an
explosive chemistry together through a series of power
trio recordings with bassist Stu Hamm 1998's Show Me What You Can Do,
2000's The Light Beyond and 2002's GHS3).
Gambale's bittersweet wate-time number
"From Naples To Heaven", carries a distinctly Mediterranean
feel with Coster's accordion work. That affecting piece is
a dedication to Frank's late father Lorenzo, who hailed
from Naples, Italy. The tightly executed, metrically-challenging
unison lines that pop up throughout "Baton Rouge"
show the influence of South Indian motifs on
Smith's U.S. drumming sensibility. As he explains,
The tune is in 5/4 - the drums and bass play 2+3 while
the guitar plays 3+2 - and uses some South Indian Carnatic
rhythmic devises that I've learned by playing with some
fantastic Indian musicians. The ghatam master T.H.
"Vikku" Vmayakram (a founding member of Shakti)
taught me the rhythm that we used as an ending.
We jammed on the feels and Baron, Frank and Tom came up
with their parts, it's a true band offering."
"Fine Line", the other acoustic trio improvisation,
again has Smith switching from drumset to Udu drum
alongside Coster's accordion and Gambale's steel string
acoustic guitar. And the band closes out the collection in
powerhouse fashion with "High Wire," a full-out fusion
effort that recalls Return To Forevers 1974 fusion an"-----
"Beyond The Seventh Galaxy" from Where Have I Known You Before.
This volatile piece is marked by Smith's agressive
backbeats, precise stop-time unison line and
a take-no-prisoners approach to soloing by Gambale,
whose ferocious sweeping demonstration here will
simultaneously frighten and delight aspiring ax-slingers.
There isn't a more flexible and disciplined band of
killer players on the jazz scene today than Vital Information.
And they prove it once again on Come On In.
- Bill Milkowski
Bill Milkowski is a regular contributor to Jazz Times
Jazziz, Bass Player and Modern Drummer magazines
He is also the author of "JACO: The Extraordinary And
Tragic Life Of Jaco Pastorius" (Backbeat Books)
