(Bluegrass, Fusion, Progressive) Bela Fleck with the New Grass Revival - Deviation - 1983, FLAC (tracks+.cue), lossless

Deviation is a stunning evolution of the string band tradition, brilliantly arranged and brimming with extemporaneous fireworks. Deviation is also Beta Fleck's very personal vision of the past, present and future, and represents the apotheosis of his eight years with the New Grass Revival. Deviation finds Fleck at the crossroads of his art, already moving beyond the august conventions of bluegrass
— his obvious affection for the letter and spirit of that music notwithstanding.
Certainly, in terms of acoustic music, the musicians who give Deviation life are capable of playing in any variety of styles, with grace, conviction and fire. But what makes Deviation so special is that it signals Fleck's maturing interest in rhythm, as he stretches the boundaries of composition and group improvisation. The resulting music represents one of Bela's earliest working blueprints for his futuristic jazz combo, the Flecktones, still several years down the road.
"Well," Bela tells me, "my whole life has been a blueprint for the Flecktones. New Grass was always the most explosive creative band, and that's why I remained in it for so long. I always liked the spirit of the band, which was no compromise, and they scandalized a lot of people. After a few years, however, things evolved to the point where we were at the top of the acoustic circuit, headliners and all.
"But for me, jazz was always the Holy Grail," Fleck reiterates. "I grew up in New York and I'd been playing banjo for a couple of years, even learned some Charlie Parker solos, when I first heard Chick Corea and Return To Forever play, and I thought that this was the ultimate — to be in a band that was so incredibly chopsy, and where the audience was a part of the show. It wasn't serious music where you just sat there; everyone was screaming and getting into it, and at the same time it was real complex. I guess I always had that dream in mind — that someday I'd be in a band like that."
Fleck's vision of a modern jazz banjo style persisted for years, regardless of the context, manifesting itself in many forms during his years with New Grass Revival
— but generally without the impetus of a pumping drummer. "Exactly, and that's what I never really had until Deviation — that was the missing element, and I could never figure out why what I was playing didn't sound right. But you see, it's not just a solo idiom — it's a group idiom. And I couldn't develop it until I could spend
time playing with a great rhythm section like I have today in [bassist] Victor [Wooten] and [drummer] Futureman. What made Deviation so special is that I was able to experience for the first time how powerful my music could be with a drummer."
And in Kenny Malone, Fleck found the perfect percussive complement to the delicate acoustic textures of banjo, guitar, mandolin, fiddle, Dobro and bass. Malone's tight, bright tuning and delicate touch recall Kenny Clarke and Connie Kay's supple drive with the Modern Jazz Quartet, and his quicksilver brush feature "Malone" illustrates just how far out Kenny can go when the situation requires freedom instead of restraint.
Malone's feature and a series of lovely solo miniatures by Bela and Mark O'Connor (on fiddle), act as programming interludes, and give listeners a chance to catch their breath in between each of the group workouts. The title tune puts listeners in the front seat of a souped up jalopy, as if the Mahavishnu Orchestra were playing a Bill Monroe breakdown, as Flynn and Reck introduce the theme over Bush's chopping funk beat. "I like things to have rhythmic as well as melodic hooks," Reck notes. "And almost every tune that I write, for me to consider it a completed tune, it has to have that rhythmic element in there somewhere. Like it has to groove, but then there's this moment of uncertainty as to what is the groove."
The succession of solos on "Deviation" illuminates the beauty of each man's line: Bush's busybee, bell like phrasing, Flynn's aggressive cross-picking, and Reek's remarkable melodic fluency, taking the banjo well beyond simple percussive figures into complex Pat Martino like rhythmic modulations. Bela lights up at the mention of this great guitarist. "Pat [Martino] was my favorite guitarist for the longest time... The way he had of developing these long, long melodic lines, his rhythmic sophistication, and the fact that he picked every note so cleanly meant a lot to me as a banjo player. I feel his influence to this day."
"Nuns For Nixon" explores the swing idiom a la Django Reinhardt and Bob Wills, with a big bouncy shuffle beat and intricate contrapuntal details behind each soloist. Fleck explains the title with a shrug and a boyish smirk. "The title means... nothing. It just comes down to my strange sense of humor, and the fact that I get a kick out of being onstage and hearing thousands of people yelling 'Cosmic Hippo' and 'Nuns For Nixon."
"Moontides" is this writer's personal favorite, drawing as it does on the work of another influential acoustic band — John McLaughlin's Shakti. Beta's lovely arpeg-giated guitar figures seem to alternate between ragtime and raga forms, with a turnaround in seven, inspiring a series of ruminative, eastern-flavored solos by Bush, Douglas, O'Connor and Reck (who again transcends the percussive nature of banjo with lilting harmonics and dreamy chords — first as arpeggios than as octaves — that play cat and mouse with the form's changes).
"Ambrose" explores another exotic locale, this time with overtones of calypso, salsa and funk, as Reek's cunning cross-rhythms and unison figures amplify different elements of the groove.
"Jalmon With Salmon" is just that, an upbeat excerpt from a group improvisation featuring some of Fleck's more funkified playing.
And the concluding "Places" brings Deviation full circle, as the country airs of rural America and Ireland seem to intersect in an evocative fiddler's theme and Reek's trademark cross-rhythms. "Duke Ellington had this wonderful suite he wrote for his first Carnegie Hall concert called 'Black, Brown and Beige,' says Reck. "To me, the piece seems to say that American culture is a beautiful fabric formed of many different threads. On both a personal and musical level I've always tried to reflect that notion of beauty in diversity, and to have fun with it, too." Which pretty much sums up the exploratory verve of Deviation and Fleck's subsequent work with the Flecktones. It is the sound of a work in progress, of a master musician who never grows too old to remain a wide-eyed, enthusiastic student.
CHIP STERN

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auCDtect: CD records authenticity detector, version 0.8.2
Copyright (c) 2004 Oleg Berngardt. All rights reserved.
Copyright (c) 2004 Alexander Djourik. All rights reserved.
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