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INTEGRATION
Produced by John Stevens Loose Torque LT 005 Price (pounds sterling)
£10.00 + p&p £1.95 | q
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John was
convalescing after a knee operation. He sat listening to Curtis Mayfield, Bill
Withers, Bobby Bland, Sly…and decided he would like to play with electric
instruments and utilise rock /funk rhythms while maintaining a free approach
to collective improvisation.
'The quality that I admire most in Away is their subversiveness. To the superficial
listener they can sound like the next crossover band on the conveyor belt. Periodically,
the ear is engaged by an indifferent disco riff, but that riff has a habit of
imploding into sudden free music, and once again we’re back in Blackwell/Higgins
territory – melodic drumming, the hippist of interplay, fine solos, fluid
music….'STEVE LAKE Melody Maker - on the Phonogram studio album ‘Somewhere
In Between’ 1976
'John Stevens and the art of fugue is an explosive enough combination at the
best of times; unleashed on Friday nights Marquee, London, it blew away tourists
and the incurious regulars alike with a supremely confident set. Stevens in
his usual amiable way, urged the audience to let it all hang out – "you
can even show ANIMOSITY, if you like"- and the band then launched into
the deceptively laconic "Can’t explain" The beauty of Away’s
electric jazz lies in its bold linear quality, which of course makes it highly
accessible to a wide audience of rock fans. A potential danger, maybe, but their
consistently articulate approach to the contrapuntal formula never ceases to
amaze for sheer inventiveness. Away really does qualify as the proverbial irresistible
force – against which few objects remain immovable for long.' MAUREEN PATON
Melody Maker
'Away represents some of the highest possibilities of electric rhythm-based
music. What Stevens has put together is a group that embodies everything that
other fusion bands were supposed to be, but somehow never were; that is, you
take the rhythmic impetus of rock, which deals mainly with common time, you
take rocks much-vaunted enthusiasm and energy and you bring to these elements
the instrumental finess and improvising intelligence of contemporary jazz. Except
that in the case of Away the fusion is not that conscious or contrived anyhow.
There’s no hint of compromise here. These guys just play what they are,
and it comes out as free rock, bypassing completely the clichés of most
electric jazz, jazz rock, disco jazz, jazz funk, fusion music or whatever. As
in every John Stevens group, there’s a lot of humanity here. These musicians
play from the heart. They don’t attempt to blind the listener with technique
(which is the normal jazz rock modus operandi – witness the sterile acrobatics
of Chick Correa, Stanley Clarke and John Mclaughlin); they aren’t in the
least pompous or condescending in their attitude to rock; and they retain their
sense of humour and their hip wit at all times.'
STEVE LAKE Melody Maker -on the Phonogram studio album "Mazin’ Ennit"
1977
'Stevens and his two bass players sound extraordinary, the nearest thing you’ll
hear in this country to the kind of rhythm section that Miles Davis now uses
– where you can happily listen to them mark time for half an album and
not feel something’s missing.'
JOHN FORDHAM Time Out
'The state of the art defined. John Stevens Away offer up for inspection a merger
method that embraces jazz, rock and more besides with purposeful equanimity
that makes most illustrious American fusioneers seem like the perfunktory pranksters
they probably are.'
ANGUS MACKINNON New Musical Express 1977
