Author: Peter Podbrežnik
Artist: Jade Warrior
Label: Island Records
Release: 1975
Running time: 44:35
Rating: 5/5
From the album »Floating World« (1974) onward, British prog rock champions Jade Warrior spent most of their career as an instrumental duo made up of two multi-instrumentalists, flutist/percussionist Jon Field and guitarist/percussionist Tony Duhig, backed by a whole cast of occasional players. Weaving colorful, complex layers of ambient music with touches of prog rock, classical, jazz and world music, they were, alongside Brian Eno (ex-Roxy Music), true pioneers and big-time innovators in their field back then. »Waves« was an even more ambitious experiment than its brilliant predecessor »Floating World«: an album built around a title suite that, because of the LP’s time limit, got split into two parts, »Waves (part 1)« and »Waves (part 2)«, which together add up to more than forty minutes of pure ambient-meditative instrumental unplugging, full of unpredictable experimental surprises.
»Waves« was an extremely complex project, with plenty of unusual time shifts, sprawling rhythmic layers and intricate variations on flute and guitar, yet at the same time it’s wildly listenable and accessible, even for those who swear by ‘sacred simplicity’ in music, since the ever-shifting atmosphere mostly stays in the register of bright, friendly, at times almost meditative ambient shades. Compared to its predecessor, it had a bit more of a jazzy tint. Throughout this concept album you can repeatedly feel certain elements of world music, mainly rhythmic ones, especially from the Far East, which has always been a major inspiration for this legendary band, named after a warrior from ancient Japan. The cover, with its tsunami, symbolizes this too: it belongs to the golden age of yukio philosophy and pays tribute to the traditional Japanese sense of aesthetics, exceptional in so many areas of life and above all in the arts.
The two multi-instrumentalists handled the production and played most of the keyboards, guitars and percussion, while Tony’s brother David Duhig occasionally joined in on electric guitar, along with the legendary Steve Winwood (Spencer Davis Group, Traffic, Blind Faith) on keyboards, the man who was key to Jade Warrior carrying on at all after they’d planned to call it quits for good in 1973, once their contract with Vertigo ran out.
»Waves (part 1)« carries the listener through an extraordinarily varied set of ambient layers and, riding a gigantic water wave, takes their mind on a wonderful trip through some of the most exotic places imaginable: from the depths of the sea, a waterfall in the middle of a bright clearing and a bamboo forest to a paradise garden echoing with birdsong. The opening synthesizer effect successfully conjures the roar of a colossal wave, and then, on the wings of gentle flute and guitar variations, a distinctly ethereal, serene atmosphere gradually takes shape. Only Tony Duhig’s sharp electric guitar improvisations cut through it now and then, while the keyboard variety is ‘to blame’ for some of the most beautiful classical-jazz arrangements in all of Jade Warrior’s history. The percussion improvisations, which bring in elements of world music, are crucial for building the exotic atmosphere, while Field’s often playful flute adds a generous dose of pastoral charm. The way the ethereal atmosphere shifts through different shades of color is outstanding and a real feast for anyone who loves music for the ‘body and soul’.
»Waves (part 2)« is an even better part of the suite, with even more exotic world music motifs, like the birdsong effects that conjure up the ambience of a paradise garden, while Tony Duhig is even more active with his occasional electric guitar improvisations. Steve Winwood is, as expected, superb on mini moog and piano, and a major source of ethereal refinement in the individual arrangements. Birdsong over gentle acoustic guitar chords eventually makes room for subtle ambient layers built from jazz-seasoned guitar and flute improvisations. The exotic layers of vividly colored percussion are now and then chopped up by sharpened electric guitar improvisations that somehow disturb the ‘peace in paradise’ and keep sending the listener off toward a new ambient destination. Winwood’s chameleon-like mini moog variations sound as if a mad Japanese mystic or sorcerer had just marched into the paradise garden and started messing around with bizarre magical experiments. Gentle flute sounds and a calm acoustic guitar melody once again conjure up the meditative atmosphere that rules most of the album, while experimental synthesizer variations create the real feeling of a light dive into the depths of the sea in the middle of the vast Pacific Ocean. The closing sounds evoke the calls of whales.
»Waves« was the peak of the gorgeous ambient journeys through world music from the one-of-a-kind Jade Warrior, one of the most fascinating and most often misunderstood progressive rock collectives of all time. Despite the nice successes Mike Oldfield and Brian Eno were enjoying at the time, Field and Duhig knew full well that a foray into fully instrumental music, with a piece so long it was totally unsuited to radio play, was commercial suicide, especially for a band that most people had, until then, first come to know as a rock band. But their love of unbridled experimentalism and adventure won out, so the two stayed true to their wonderful musical vision to the very end.
Line-up
Tony Duhig – guitar, percussion, keyboards, bass guitar
Jon Field – flute, guitar, percussion, keyboards
GUEST MUSICIANS:
David Duhig – guitar
Graham Morgan – drums
Suzi – vocalizations
Maggie Thomas – alto effect
Steve Winwood – keyboards
Production
Jon Field and Tony Duhig
Track list
1. Waves, Part 1 (19:52)
2. Waves, Part 2 (24:34)
