SACD Billy Cobham – Spectrum

Billy Cobham’s solo debut as a hybrid stereo SACD from the Atlantic 75 Series: Spectrum moves from the thunder of “Quadrant 4” and the groove of “Stratus” to Jan Hammer’s solo piano miniature – all ten tracks in one continuous sequence.

A drummer’s debut, written by the drummer

Spectrum, Billy Cobham’s first album as a leader, is about far more than room for drum solos. He composed every piece and produced the recording himself, spending three days at New York’s Electric Lady Studios in May 1973. Cobham was still a member of the Mahavishnu Orchestra at the time, so the project grew in the middle of that period rather than after it.

Jan Hammer links the two worlds, playing acoustic piano, electric piano and Moog synthesizer. With Tommy Bolin on guitar and Leland Sklar on electric bass, the group heard on “Quadrant 4”, “Stratus” and “Red Baron” takes shape. Listen to how the work is shared out: a repeating bass figure gives guitar and keyboards a frame to move in, while the drums shape how that repetition develops.

Two line-ups instead of one formula

That quartet does not play the whole album. The title track and “Le Lis” bring in musicians including Joe Farrell, Jimmy Owens, Ron Carter and Ray Barretto, with John Tropea adding guitar on “Le Lis”. With Carter, the bass changes to double bass. The instrumental resources shift, while Cobham’s writing holds everything together.

“To the Women in My Life” goes smaller still: a short unaccompanied piano piece by Hammer on which the leader does not play at all. A drummer’s debut pauses to let someone else speak alone – one reason the record’s shape cannot be reduced to its most energetic passages. Follow the transitions as well as the pieces, and the changing scale of each ensemble becomes part of the listening experience.

A broken string that stayed on the record

During his solo on “Taurian Matador”, Tommy Bolin’s high E string broke. He kept playing, and the moment remains on the recording. It gives you a precise musical event to follow: how does a player carry on with an idea when his instrument suddenly offers fewer options?

Ken Scott recorded and mixed the album. The music was captured in New York and mixed at Trident Studios in London. Scott had recently worked with David Bowie and was also involved in Birds of Fire, which places Spectrum among overlapping working worlds: rock guitar, synthesizer, horns and two kinds of bass are the practical tools of musicians and engineers moving between projects.

The Atlantic 75 hybrid stereo SACD

CAPA 072 SA is a hybrid stereo SACD from the Analogue Productions Atlantic 75 Series. The SACD layer plays on SACD-capable players, the CD layer on any conventional CD player. The disc contains the ten tracks of the original album; the short introductory pieces belong to that programme and are not bonus material.

You order from Michael 45 in Germany. We arrange the US import and ship from Hilden.

More from the series: Atlantic 75 Series

Also in another edition: Spectrum

Customer question: Buying Analogue Productions records in Europe

Musicians

Documented selection of participating musicians. Personnel may vary by track; this list does not claim to be complete.

Tommy Bolin and Leland Sklar belong to the electric core group. Joe Farrell, Jimmy Owens, Ron Carter and Ray Barretto appear with the other lineup; John Tropea plays on “Le Lis”.