FORECAST: TOMORROW
by WEATHER REPORT

Greatest hits plus

By Rick Hines, Nov. 22, 2009

There have been several attempts to represent Weather Report with single disc collections. Unfortunately, lengthy compositions, stylistic diversity, career span, and musician changes make such cursory overviews highly problematic. This multi-disc set comes fairly close to capturing what the excitement was all about.

Weather Report was arguably the last great ensemble from the classic age of jazz when the music continually moved "outward." Born in the ashes of Miles Davis' Bitches Brew band, keyboardist Josef Zawinul and sax player Wayne Shorter, along with a string of great bassist/composers, continually tried to push their music in a forward direction, often abandoning entire styles in the interest of exploration. This set presents some of the best examples of their studio recordings.

As is to be expected with musicians of this caliber, the music is almost uniformly superb. Considering how much other Weather Report music could have been included here, the first few tracks featuring other artists doing proto-Weather Report music is an unnecessary waste of disc space (this music is easily available elsewhere). The jewel of the "rarities" is the energetic live rendition of Nubian Sundance. After listening to these songs as presented in chronological order, it might seem that the loss of superman bassist Jaco Pastorius left them somewhat adrift. The last few tracks seem to rehash older ideas, leading to the inevitable dissolution of the band.

For the Weather Report neophyte, this is an excellent career overview. For the collector who has this music on the original albums, the point of interest is the DVD. It captures a live performance from the Mr. Gone tour, with Jaco, at possibly the peak of the band's performing career. The cameras focus on Zawinul for the most part, and you get a great view of the man's hands pumping out melodies like there was no tomorrow (I was reminded of watching Jimi Hendrix, whose hands often seemed to move over the guitar with a mind of their own). Jaco performs here before his mental powers began to decline, and he proves a worthy foil to Zawinul and Shorter, providing inventive support work and showing off his considerable talents during solos. I found Shorter's Zen-like meditations somewhat of a surprise, but when you're playing with busy stylists like his bandmates, his minimalist, repetitive sax ruminations are the perfect counterpoint. Which isn't to say Shorter doesn't rip off a heated solo now and again!

If you are a Weather Report fan already, you might want to consider if the cost justifies the few musical rarities or the DVD (the book included is of small interest; mainly it's a gushing ode to Zawinul and Shorter with the occasional biographical fact tossed in). If you are a jazz fan who wants an instant Weather Report collection for their library, it is definitely preferable to the other greatest hits collections. I dock the box set one star for the weakly written book and the lack of more rarities (how much live material must be out there?!), but overall a strong look at a complex band.