Customer Reviews

Stoned Soul Picnic

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

If you love the vibes, then you'll love this cd. Roy Ayers has been around for decades and is still one of my favs. Play this one by candlelight, while sipping wine with the company of someone special!!

As some have already asserted, this is not the music you'd expect from the funk/ fusion Roy Ayers of Mystic Voyage. This album is a whole other kind of beast. Ayers and band do lay down the funk, but without electric instruments and effects that can actually overpower the musical element. Hancock always comes through with strong solos and Ayers' improvisation on "Wave" is nothing short of ecstacy. If anything, it suffers from songs that are a little too long and a disk that is way too short. Lush orchestration and top-notch musicianship are the staples that make this LP a solid effort.

This is not the starting point if you want to know what Roy Ayers is all about. Stone Soul Picnic was made in 1968, and features none of the fat, funky grooves that define this most brilliant of artists.
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Which does not detract from this album a bit. Here, Ayers formed a band that included Ron Carter, Herbie Hancock, and Gary Bartz, all playing or soon to play with Miles Davis. Using them, Ayers covers the great Laura Nyro title track, Jobim's "Wave," and other popular tracks of the day. All of this is done in straight jazz style, well played by this all=star band.

There is nothing wrong with this, just know what you are buying and if new to Ayers, know that this is only an excellent warm up. For the music Ayers is known and so rightfully revered for, start with, say, Everybody Loves The Sunshine and the absolutely lush and unbeatable Coffy

...Creo que todo lo editado por Roy Ayers en la década del '60 es altamente recomendable. Junto a Hancock y compañia, y la producción de Herbie Mann, logró valiosas piezas musicales. Fue la base de lo que vendría en los '70 con Ubiquity y Polydor. Ojalá se editara "West Coast Vibes" de 1963 en CD para poder disfrutalo junto a esta joyas que grabó en dicha década...Comprarlo con los ojos cerrados...
José Pablo

An early Atlantic production by Herbie Mann re-released by the normally tasteful 32 records.If you're familiar with the work that Ayers went on to do in the seventies then listening to this will come as a great disappointment.The main problem seems to have been an unwillingness to edit or deny players the right to solo. So a couple of the tracks "What the people say"(8.09) and "Wave"(7.59) are overlong. A couple of the compositions are weak- "A rose for Cindy" is not classic Ayers, and "Lil's paradise" was probably included because composer Charles Tolliver is the trumpet/flugel on the session.Somehow the presence of Herbie Hancock on piano,and Hubert Laws on flute doesn't save the session. There IS some good ensemble playing but the whole album is uneven and not representative of what Roy Ayers went on to do later.