Customer Reviews

Streamline

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This is probably THE most awesome jazz-fusion album ever! I can't believe they waited SO long to put it out on CD! I have been waiting for this for 15 years! From the incredible opening "Struttin'" right on through the funked up version of "Lady Madonna" with Chaka Khan's soaring vocals on the break, to the blistering guitar work on "Earthlings" and on to the final cut "Cosmic Indigo" this record will BLOW YOU AWAY!

If you are into jazz-fusion and can only afford one album, this is the one you should buy!!! The tunes are all wired and the players are all at the top of their game on this one. The sonic presence of the lead guitar on "Earthlings" will pin you back and make you wonder how they got such a spectacular sound onto the recording over 20 years ago!

It's got enough jazz in it for the jazz buffs, and more than enough fusion to draw the rock crowd in. If you want, you can even sample "12 Bars from Mars" on your computer, and play it back at half speed to find out what the heck it is (subtle hint).

Buy it, put it in, crank up the volume and be prepared to be inspired, impressed, and blown away . . . all at the same time! You will finally know what the "REPEAT ALL" button on your CD player is for! Buy, buy, buy! Listen, listen, listen! Cherish, cherish, cherish! Listen some more!

I guarantee you will not regret buying this one, unless you ONLY go for classical music. If that's the case, all of the above is lost on you anyway.

Fantastic CD. I agree with the other reviews. The main things that set this project apart were Larry Dunn's production (his synth programming and orchestration is absolutely gorgeous, as always!) and something not mentioned in the previous reviews: Marcus Miller (how could you not mention MM?!?)!! Oh my god, the tone, the groove! Marcus was only about 18 years old on this CD, but had certainly done his homework. This wasn't Marcus' first recording, but among his first. It was definitely his highest profile recording up to that time, and notable because he was playing with Lenny White, inviting direct comparison with Stanley Clarke. Marcus doesn't shy away from the challenge, and even throws in a Stanley lick or two, as he sometimes did in this early phase of his career (check out Brecker Brothers' Detente). This CD really marks Marcus' arrival, which is (not coincidentally) also the beginning of the end of the Stanley Clarke / Jaco Pastorius era.

Following in the lead of his band Return To Forever's

nagging hyperbole,most of Lenny White's solo albums have been

little more then excersises in overplaying-only the most intellectual and skilled of musicians would be likely to even

appreciate them.But on 1978's 'Streamline' Lenny White went all

out to change all that.Across eleven songs the arrangements are

tightly wound and the accompanyment extremely glossy.High production values are prominant but so is a much welcome sense

of actual melody and song quality.

The instrumental "Pooh Bear" is probably the

best example of what great fusion should be-grooving,upbeat

and expressive and Larry Dunn's production does give some of these tunes and Earth,Wind & Fire style.In the meantime Chaka Khan joins in to throw down a throbbing funk rendition of

"Lady Madonna" (actually it may even wipe the floor with

The Beatles original as well).Even "12 Bars From Mars" and

"Earthlings" may even give a little missive from the funk-rock

book while "Struttin'" and "Time" are pure vocal funk!Even the

more pure fusiony tunes "Lockie's Inspiration","I'll See You

Again" and "Night Games" are far more structured."Cosmic Indigo"

ends off the whole thing veturing into acoustic jazz.All this being said due to the often uneven nature of Lenny White albums

this is probably the first album you should purchase by this artist!

I needed to replace my cassette tape of Streamline, purchased a generation ago, such is my love of this album. Why do I love it? Lets go back almost 30 years. Lenny, of Jazz Rock giants Return to Forever, does things funky. A young kid on the bass, Marcus Miller, who seems to have a promising career ahead of him, whacks out some fast and funky bass lines. There's a powerful version of Lennon and McCartney's Lady Madonna, sung by the girl from Rufus, Chaka Khan, Lenny does his sci-fi space thing with a guitar-led rock mini-classic, 12 bars from Mars, there's a little bit of be-bop; a whole heap of funk; a good portion of jazz rock. After my first hearing of this album, I dreamed of doing two things. Playing the bass and playing the drums. I listened to this CD last night, and I wanted to do two things. Learn the bass and learn the drums. Listen to this album, you'll understand.

I've been buying alot of my old 70's and early 80's fusion cd's since my vinyl has been all but destroyed from repeated playings and abuse. I found Lenny White's Big City and Venesian Summer in a used CD bin in a record store in Baltimore. Listening to Lenny old stuff reminded me of how much I dug Streamline when it released. This CD is totally slamming and the sound still sounds fresh. I played the cd in my car for a 70's homeboy and he literally lost his mind. He wanted to borrow it but I remembered that was how all my vinyl got destroyed. The previous review was right on. The Larry Dunn touch was magic. Remember Caldera, Larry's fusion band featuring Eddie Del Barrio, George Strunz, this CD has that kind of magic. The Marcus Miller bass sets this cd ablaze. Buy,Listen and Enjoy!!

This album is truly some of Lenny's best work. This is one of an array of albums showing Lenny at the peak of his creative powers in a very special time in jazz-fusion history. He truly takes his place as an icon of the jazz-fusion movement.

One might expect from the hyperactive energy expended on his previous The Adventures of Astral Pirates that he'd follow up that album with one of a similar style. On the other hand he decides to change things up a great deal here. This is one of those albums that actually lives up to it's title because the sound this captures musically is in fact streamlined. EWF keyboardist Larry Dunn produced this album after he'd been striking musical gold with other jazz-funk-R&B names as Ramsey Lewis,Dee Dee Bridgewater and Stanley Turrentine so Lenny White was only another logical step. From the outset Lenny White's solo albums had already forged ahead with a slicker production style and more carefully crafted R&B/funk type songs than those he might've done with the more musicianly Return To Forever and this one really took the cake on that end by turning down the fusion and turning up the funk. That doesn't however mean the album lacks excitment. Employing both the talents of a very young Marcus Miller on bass as well as Nich Moroch and Jamie Glazer on guitars the albums pops out with so much life,intelligence and emotional peaks that some elements of it may give you goose bumps. Very eclectic rhythmically this album varies from the funk-rock fusion hybrids of "Struttin","Earthlings" and the more kinetic "Spazmo Strikes Again" to sleek,sophistifunk covers of "Lady Madonna" and "Time",the former featuring Chaka Khan in one her best guest performances and both showcasing the very Maurice White styled vocals of keyboard player Don Blackman. The instrumental "Pooh Bear",a songwriting collaboration with Weldon Irvine takes the album in terms of rhythm as far as it actually could go; it's somewhere between Return To Forever,George Duke and EWF with it's mixtures of choral keyboards,backup vocals and somehow even choral drumming. The midtempo instrumental "I'll See You Again" has a very obvious EWF influence,in particular the song "After The Love Has Gone" except the electronics are turned up a lot more and that same flavor is traslated to Marcus Miller's brief segue "Lockie's Inspiration". Only Miller's composition "Night Games" leans more toward the more traditional jazz fusion territory and the album ends with Don Blackman's more acoustic based "Cosmic Indigo". Even though this tends to be one of Lenny White's more forgotton albums it is one of the best Lenny ever made and something of a dry run for his then upcoming work with Twennynine.

I first found out about Lenny White a day before going to college in 1988 when I got myself a going away present, Miles' B-Brew. White was in the collective of young musicians Miles assembled for that album

Streamline is a whole other story: a great album of funk and disco with 1970s synthesizer moves. This is thick, juicy music with great playing, foot stomp, and coral vocals added to some numbers for good measure.

You'll never mistake this for the early 1970s fusion albums Lenny played on, but for the funky chops that took hold later in the decade, you can't do better.

LADY MADONNA IS THE WORST COVER OF A BEATLES SONG I HAVE EVER HEARD. It is even worse than William Shatner doing Lucy In the Sky with Diamonds. It is done is some happy, crappy funk style. It is like funk lite. It isn't a good performance, and it isn't appropriate for a song like Lady Madonna.

This album is all over the place, with some fusion, some lite jazz and some funk. I don't mind variety, but this seems like a hodge podge thrown together. I think the composing is very weak and uninteresting. Someone wrote that this is what jazz fusion all about, but there isn't that much fusion and it is very light.

The best thing on this album is a 25 second instrumental. The only other track I think is interesting is the funky Earthings.

This is White's fourth solo album. The CD sound quality is fair and is about 40 minutes long. It is nothing like White's three earlier jazz-fusion masterpieces.

Lenny White appeared on Polish violinist Mickal Urbaniak's Urban Express album. In my review, said that Lenny White may have been the best musician in Return to Forever, which included Chick Corea, Al DiMeola and Stanley Clarke. Someone commented on my review that that was a ridiculous statement and that White has put out some really bad albums. I didn't think that person knew what he was talking about until I heard this album.

This album was released in 1978 when everybody, from Herbie Hancock to the Grateful Dead, was making their disco album. This album's two best songs, "12 Bars From Mars" and "Night Games", were not written by Lenny White but by other band members. They're fusion songs sounding much like Return To Forever. The intro to "12 Bars" has some martian sound effects. The songs written by Lenny White are worthwile, especially "Pooh Bear", another fusion song. "Earthlings" is the only worthwhile vocal track of three, mainly for its instrumental solos. "Spazmo Strikes Again" is a short tag to Earthlings. "Lockie's Inspiration" is an intro to the ballad "I'll See You Soon". "Time" is a good song for "disco night".