Tale Spinnin': Weather Report.
Columbia PCQ 33417, SQ quadraphonic disc, $6.98

      Every once in a while a record comes along which is so outstanding both
 musically and sonically, that it achieves almost instant status as a "demonstration
 special." This recording by Weather Report is just such a phenomenon.

     One of the extraordinary things about this recording  is that this tremendous
outpouring of really exciting sound is  the product of just five musicians. The
exceptionally talented members of Weather Report are: Joe Zawinul, composer
of four of the numbers of this disc, who plays acoustic piano, Rhodes piano,
Arp 2600 synthesizer, Melodica, West African, steel drums, cymbals, organ,
and xylophone; Wayne Shorter, composer and master of the soprano and tenor
saxes; Al Johnson on electric bass; Alyrio Lima who plays a myriad of
percussion instruments and many of a very exotic nature; and Ndugu on drums
and tympani.

      There are six original works on this disc, and while they may be generally
categorized as a sort of jazz/rock fusion, there are unusual variations on this
basic theme. For example, in Badia, we first hear at quite a low level, the eerie
soughing and sussurations of a wind machine. Then from different quadrants of
the sound field, we hear tiny temple-bells, the dissonant pizzicato of what sounds
like a loosely-strung samisen, then progressively heavier beats from a large drum
and the electric bass, all this giving the music a decidedly oriental flavor. However,
this in turn gives way to some chant-like sounds of African origin, and so help me,
at a later point, the distinctive sound of Greek bouzouki music! Sounds weird, but
it works.

     All the numbers on this disc are consistently interesting and the orchestrations
are replete with all manner of percussive sounds to delight the audiophile. From the
sonic viewpoint, this recording is a technical tour-de-force. Inner
balances among the instruments are precisely maintained, none of the instruments
over covering or masking another. There is good forward projection of the sound,
and instrumental definition and the delineation of musical timbres is of exceptional
accuracy. Overall the sound was pristine clean, with quite a wide dynamic range
for this type of music.

     This music sounds fine in stereo, but played through a good full logic SQ decoder,
it really comes alive. The mixing engineer has done a superb job of assigning the
various instruments to the quadrants of the surround-sound field in a manner that
exploits both their harmonious and contrasting sonorities. This recording
unquestionably ranks as one of the best examples of SQ technology. If your hi-fi
tastes are a bit jaded, the Weather Report is the kind of tonic that can quickly
recharge your batteries!

Review by Fred DeVan in
Audio Magazine February 1976

 Tale Spinnin': Weather Report.
 Columbia PQ 33417, SQ, $7.98.

      It is as if these men one day met and collectively decided to define a new trend in
music. From its very beginning as a band, Weather Report has been blazing bright,
wide swaths of gleaming light, illuminating the formless, dark cavern of the new music
called "fusion" by music writers an "crossover product" among the record marketeers.
Whatever it's called, it is a musical form which is viable to broad and growing
audiences- acceptable to rock-oriented ears, white audiences as well as Black, male
and female; it's commended by audiophile and musicologist alike.

       Fusion music should be sonically stunning, as well as creatively complete,
its audience is evenly distributed through all the parts of the population; yet it is
reachable enough to insure a comfortable and steady response to promotion and media.
Music for every kind of ears, even the Corporate Accountant. Cosmic music, Karmic
music!! Whatever it is we have it, and it's working out great.

       Weather Report's new album, Tale Spinnin' is a precise, definitive report on the
musical climate of this nameless form. It brings into sharp focus the directions of many
forces who have joined with Weather Report to germinate the seeds that are coming in
from all areas of the musical world. Tale Spinnin' is a straight-out barometer of the
musical future.
       This is the world Weather Report lives in. A state that is a true affirmation of one
of my pet suspicions in life--that Stanley Kubrick's orange day-date-chronograph was
running outrageously fast when he made parts of his movie.

        If W-R's world is now a relatively lonely one, as things progress, it won't be so for
long. Tale Spinnin' is a musical expression by artists with the obvious intention of
saluting their neighbors. It's certain to be applauded by their public, their critics, and their
peers. For as much as it entertains and fascinates the casual listener, to the technically
minded the disc is a constructional masterpiece of textural and musical nuances such as
Joe  Zawinul's Arp 2600 adding an edge to the attack of Wayne Shorter's saxophone
notes that were seemingly taken at random from a prearranged tone row or sequence.
But Zawinul does it so subtly that it took me five replays to begin to identify the origin
of this controlled reshaping of textural symmetry from the acoustically miked saxophone.
It sounded like a slight bit of "big D" distortion (thought my cartridge had died) when I
first heard it,  but the tone is pure Arp synthesizer and is not in time (yet it is in tune)
with the saxophone.

            The group's infinite attention to such details of their music is absolutely incredible,
yet the performance is direct and spontaneous. It is orchestrated like a
dance--undulating, dynamic, human, a living synthesis, It is never mechanical, dry or
studied, but always rich, expressive, expansive, mature uncompromised total music.
--Tale Spinnin' is all those and more, a harbinger in the blossoming move towards
uni-music, a music unfettered by convention, yet committed to communicative
perspicuity of the unity of man in a coadunate and more musical form.

          Whew!! It is really work to distill down a concept that is spoken of best in musical
terms. To mutate it down into these few words!! But this album, with its empyrean
authority and immense power, has forced me to attempt to do that. True to the
personal nature of the men involved, Tale Spinnin' is never really mind-crushingly
loud, never boisterous. It does not need to accost you with its majesty. Both Zawinul
and Shorter are quiet giants of music. Neither has the temperament to emulate the
acknowledged public stars for whom they long played a supportive role. Besides the
years spent with around Miles Davis and serving as The Jazz Piano Eclectic,
Joe Zawinul has brought his keyboard genius to a structure where
This input is not in conflict with a center-stage ego or instrument. The same can be said
for the amazing saxophones of Wayne Shorter. The Weather Report concept and style
is a personal and collective statement of the integrity and humanity of these men.
They understand the kind of humility in being real. Their music is the complete human
extension--laughing, singing, crying, dancing, fragile, intense, vital, alive!!

            Joe Zawinul, Wayne Shorter, along with Al Johnson on bass, Alyrio Lima on
percussion and Ndugu on drums, are the ultimate incarnation of the band and its
concept. Each has apparently long needed a group which felt the music they made
together was the only star, the only reason for making music.

            The sound quality in this disc is so markedly superior it can only be described as
state of the art. The performance and production are deft perfection. The disc and
this band are one of the highest expressions of contemporary music and its
creation, a creation which cannot exist without the recording arts. The recording
studio is the origin of the music. It is created via the studio, not recreated for record.
The recorded performance in its final, definitive form. Still its force, its source, is in
the streets, in the world, in life, in all of us. The music of Weather Report is a gift to
our changing world. A delicate gift with promise of a mellowing happiness coming
closer to who and what we are as human beings.

P. S.  This fusion thing has brought back an almost lost art--the liner notes!! These
liner notes by Robert Hurwitz to Tale Spinnin' are must reading. While browsing in
your record store, ask the clerk for the store copy and read them. If they don't want
to make you hear the record, nothing will. Hurwitz sums up Weather Report in 18
words: "It is rare these days to hear people sing together, to sing with great feeling,
with great warmth."
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       Sound: A +                              Performance: A+
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