Vulcan [Import]

Chris Woods (Artist) | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (December 9, 2008)
• Original Release Date: 2008
• Number of Discs: 1
• Format: Import
• Label: Esoteric
• ASIN: B001F9WIB4
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #251,359 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

30 of 30 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Historically significant, December 9, 2008

By 

DM - See all my reviews

This review is from: Vulcan (Audio CD)

First, let's get one thing straight: This is not really an unreleased solo album by former Traffic member Chris Wood. Rather, this is a collection of material that Wood (who died in 1983 at age 39) recorded in the process of *trying* to make a solo album. And while some of this material would certainly have appeared on such an album had it been made, said album never came close to being finished. (The Product Description given is undoubtedly incorrect or misleading in other ways as well, but I won't concern myself with that.)

Wood managed to have too much, and yet not enough, material for his proposed album -- too much, because all his potential song ideas wouldn't have fit on one LP; not enough, because few of the songs could really be said to have been finished. He himself never seems to have been sure just what pieces he would have included.

This disc doesn't include all the material that Wood worked on for his proposed album. Tapes have been floating around for years that include at least a few other songs besides those heard here. I've heard a couple of the missing tracks and, besides so-so but salvageable sound quality, I'm not sure why they would have been excluded; I believe others were redundant or had poor performance quality. But the eight tracks remaining (not counting a bonus track of Traffic performing one of Wood's songs live in '74) still add up to a good 49 minutes, and with one minor exception ("Sullen Moon") all are presented here with quite good sound quality.

(BTW, the CD package doesn't tell you this, but the Traffic performance features a transitional 5-man lineup from whom no other recordings have been released -- namely, the WHEN THE EAGLE FLIES lineup plus the soon-to-be-dismissed "Reebop" Kwaku Baah. This version of the band can be seen in the photo on the back cover of the SMILING PHASES compilation.)

Unlike the other original Traffic members, saxophonist/flautist Wood was not a singer or songwriter. He doesn't even really seem to have been much of a composer, as his compositions here often sound more improvised than actually "composed"; none are quite as structured as "Tragic Magic," the one solo composition he happened to place on a Traffic album. A couple tracks here have him merely soloing over what seem to be someone else's chords, and on one (the lengthy "See No Man Girl") he's more or less just put himself in the middle of an organized jam/song by other musicians.

All that is not to say that this disc is a disappointment; far from it. Though not particularly structured, all the pieces here are enjoyable to any Traffic fan who likes that band's loose, jazzy side. (All the pieces here, BTW, are 100% jazz; this is no "rock" album at all.) And don't be put off by the fact that there are two "versions" of one song ("Barbed Wire") -- the two sound *nothing* like each other.

For any dedicated Traffic fan, especially those with a fondness for Wood's contributions, this disc is a must-have for its historical significance alone. I'm sure it won't be widely bought, and may be hard to find before long -- though, had Wood actually released a jazz album in the punk/disco era as originally planned, it probably would have been impossibly obscure by now anyway. After all, how many copies of Reebop's old solo albums do you see around?

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars excellent collection, June 3, 2011

By 

T. Baker "[e-mail]" (Tahlequah, Ok. USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Vulcan (Audio CD)

Chris Wood was musician. His skills are greatly missed. This is apparently the only chance to listen to his own projects. Some of the pieces are just that, pieces of music, but interesting none the less. Let us hope for live releases of Traffic in the future.