Customer Reviews

Way of the Sun

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When I first began to collect Jade Warrior's "Island era" albums on vinyl in the seventies I commenced with "Waves" [1975], & for a while I thought that Tony Duhig & Jon Field had reached some peak of musical achievement. I was quite mistaken. My next purchase [out of sequence with the chronology of the four albums] was "Way of the Sun" [1978]. I gave up trying to define or predict anything about Jade Warrior's music ever again.
Whatever this album's title & cover art suggest is only a thin representation of the musical depth within. The music is built around ethnic Central American themes with segments that can sound majestic & sometimes almost orchestral, while much of it is exotic, haunting, & mystical.
I have always loved the sound of flute, & this album is a flute lover's delight. Once again Jon Field's flutes evoke celestial beauties & harmonies in partnership with Tony Duhig's guitars, both electric & acoustic. But Tony's electric guitar playing on this album is nothing short of mesmerizing, especially on the final track.
The first track "Sun Ra" creates a vivid impression of a sunrise. Then "Sun Child" is centered around a delightful flute tune, with picollos also, & the enchanting sounds of harp played by a guest musician. "Moon Tears" is a sweetly earthy tune played with both wooden flute & conventional flutes as well as guitars, & a myriad of small bells & chimes as it drifts into "Heaven Stone", a beautiful flute piece with cool jazz-like accompaniment largely from acoustic guitars. "Way of the Sun" ventures into a more familiar Latin American influence with Tony Duhig's electric guitars multi-tracked. Then "River Song" has multi-tracked flutes producing joyful trills & flutters. "Carnival" has a lively rumba-like rhythm, followed by "Dance of the Sun", based on a tribal percussion beat.

Most tracks contain modest keyboard backing with Duhig's electric guitar frequently drifting in & then fading out of the various musical segments. As with the earlier masterpiece "Waves" there is a real musical & recording mastery in this album. At the very least this music may send you somewhere else for a while.
But nothing will prepare the listener for the awesome final track titled "Death of Ra" which has Tony Duhig's electric guitar & Jon Field's flute harmonising with sad overtones which are almost tearfully beautiful.

Where on Earth did two Englishmen find the inspiration to create music like this? "Way of the Sun" is the last of Jade Warrior's "Island era" albums. I can certainly recommend all of them, but don't miss this one, it's a masterpiece.

"Way of the Sun" is a more upbeat album than their previous 3 releases, blending Eastern sounds with soft fusion and progressive. Soft flute passages mix with acoustic guitars and lush percussive waves, similar at times to Mike Oldfield and even Gandalf.

Way of the Sun sounds like it was influenced by both Santana and Camel- the incredible guitar playing of the former, and the instantly jaw-droppingly beautiful instrumental playing of the latter.

Why is it that whenever I listen to any rock album from the 70's, I find that at least 80% of the music is good? Bands back then knew how to put a song together.

Make sure when you listen to this Jade Warrior album you have the lights off in your room and you're feeling warm, because the music contains a friendly and comfortable atmosphere that's sure to please fans of beautiful instrumental playing and especially Camel fans.

We really need for the 70's to make a comeback with young people today. Maybe someone 14 years old will find out about Jade Warrior, and recommend the music to their friends, and that will start a trend that will carry all through North America and Europe.

The 4 albums released by Jade Warrior on Island records are mystical and magical, combining eastern elements with western instrumental melodies. This music is hard to describe at best, it is eclectic, instrumental, creative, and only for some, perhaps especially for those into the progressive music scene of the early 70's, those into Yes and Genesis and King Crimson etc.. bearing in mind that these bands had vocalists, whereas Jade Warrior does not (at least not on these 4 releases).
The albums are "Waves", "Kites", "Way of the Sun" and "Floating World".
The music is 5 star, the remastering (in my humble opinion) is 3 star and sadly very poor. I am still waiting for these albums to be remastered as they deserve to be. These Eclectic record remasters sound "stretched and thin", and the volume difference between the quiet pieces and louder pieces is too exceptional, such that one is listening to this music with the volume control in hand, continually adjusting the sound - a very unpleasant and frustrating experience.
The sound engineers who did these remasters should be sacked.
I have heard remasters of earlier Jade Warrior albums from the non-Island period, and they have made the music sound full and rich and warm, with the bass in evidence and the electronics sounding deep and tonal. I hope somebody can do this with these albums one day, because they deserve it. It amazes me that some 30+ years after these albums were released, sound engineers can still butcher them, somebody please give the master tapes to a professional engineer to produce.

I love Jade Warrior's spacey mood music and this album is one of my favorites. From the first song to the last it paints a great cohesive picture that kind of reminds me of Egypt and/or South America. It demands serious, not casual listening however. You can't be walking around or washing the dishes and appreciate this album(or other Jade Warrior albums). The use of many different instruments sound great through my Altecs and peak with "The Death of Ra". The Death of Ra is a great emotional funeral songs with great guitar work in the mold of Santana. I recommend this album if you like percussive, spacey instrumental type music. It ain't Chuck Berry!

Among the most neglected bands in history, and during the brief ISLAND record label years, one of the most progressive for their time...

WAVES, FLOATING WORLD, KITES and WAY OF THE SUN..... I used to listen to these 4 albums (the pinnacle of Jade Warrior production) But in the 70's the LP pressings were not ideal, even the expensive imports had noisy grooves. Recently I discovered these unique treasures were remastered by ECLECTIC. They have all the full sound and separation of those originals -- sans snap, crackle and pop. Thank God.

Good liner notes as well.

For the newcomer, here's who they are...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jade_Warrior_(band)