Customer Reviews

Offramp (Shm-CD)

5 star:		(23)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I love this album. It's very beautiful and it takes me away, how can I describe it? If you are familiar with Brazilian music, you will adapt very easily to the music contained herein...and even though this is most assuredly a jazz release, there is a definite musical tie-in, especially with the various added percussion and Milton-esque vocal work on several of the tracks.

Pat puts to heavy use his now-signature Synclavier guitar, triggering horn-like sounds throughout several songs as well. The ensemble work and songwriting are pure magic and all the band members get to show their talents.

If you're a new fan of Pat Metheny, his music is very pleasant at first listen, but it becomes increasingly engrossing after that, soon you become an addict, so you've been warned.

Save this album for last...it's too beautiful!

Metheney found his sound. He changed the band line-up, Jaco clone Mark Egan was out as was Dan Gottleib (great drummer who went on tour with John McGlaughlin). The sound became much more accesible and the tunes less jammy. The albums previous like American Garage and Group were searching for this formula. The song James is a track they performed live but had not previously appeared on record. The reference is to James Taylor, who Metheny is a fan of. Lyle Mays is usual good form, but the album is on the mellow side, getting away from jazz rhythms and getting in the groove. Yes the title track is the most challenging listen on the album but it is a nice break from the mellowness that opens and closes the program. After this would come "Travels" the live album, which was quite a showcase, and then Metheny would bring Latin influences into the sound and go over the top with popularity. His later jazz albums with the likes of Charlie Haden and Ornette Coleman are really little vacations for Pat, they don't really influence the sound of his PMG recordings as far as I hear, certainly to the point of Offramp. The production is great and the playing first-rate. I can recommend this album as a good starting point. Still Life Talking is also a good follow-up. If you go back you do so at your own risk, as the catalogue is interesting but uneven. Look for solo projects Watercolours and Bright Size Life (with Jaco and Pat keeping it mellow for Manfred Eicher at ECM) as early gems.

This CD is soooo fantastic! Get in your car - pop this CD in and go for a long ride. It's truly a fabulous, musical mind-expanding trip.

I got a new mp3 player (Rio Nitrus which I love) and went back through my cd collection including my many PM cds. I gotta say he has done some great stuff, but this cd has more great songs than any other and that is saying alot. If I could only take one PM cd with me to a desert island this would be it.

I am writing this review 15 yr after I had bought this album and after listening to many other Pat Metheny's work. In other words, I am writing about this album having at least 15 other Metheny's CDs as a framework of reference. That said, "Offramp" still stands as a unique piece; full of experimentation, plenty of fussion, and charged with boundless creativity. Take this CD away from Metheny's discography and you will definitely get an incomplete view of his legacy. If you remove "Letter from Home", or even "First Circle" from the picture, the final product may not be terribly altered. Whatever came before or after, does not compare to "Offramp". Perhaps the closest equivalent to "Offramp" in modern times is "Imaginary Day".

I will not keep the reader lost with more comparative assessments of Metheny's work. From an absolute standpoint then, this work is still in my opinion a really unique product of contemporary jazz.

This CD contains the best Metheny song of all time, Are You Going With Me. If you have to buy only one album by the master, buy this one. Enough said.

Hmmmmm, very intriguing. Certain songs can really make one think about death. The opening on this masterpiece sounds like one is catching a heart attack and passes away. This album left me in suspense. It is amazing how creative, unique, distinctive, abstract, exciting and haunting Pat Matheny's work can be...

To actually be exposed to and enjoy such music, it has great pontential to allow one to be more open-minded,optimistic, PASSIONATE... Oh the PASSION! Pouvez-vous le sentir?

I can't add much to the previous praise of this album, but i love Metheny and Mays and i wish they would revisit the Offramp style, totally unique and musically striking. Pat's always evolving, experimenting, discovering...he and Lyle struck gold with these penetrating, rhythmic synclavier compositions.

This is Metheney's most abstract piece of work, and his finest. "Are You Going With Me?" is the best fusion piece ever composed. "James" is pure jazz at its best. The title track is a wild ride into oblivion. If you're a true Metheny fan, like I am, this is in your collection. Buy it and experience!!

The exotic, African-flavored "Barcarolle" kicks off this hauntingly beautiful collection of compositions penned alone by Pat Metheny or with keyboardist Lyle Mays. This is the album which first introduced me to Metheny's and the Group's incomparable and distinctive sound. It still remains my very favorite Metheny recording and the one album I believe is his most consistently prolific work. Other listeners throughout the years have certainly agreed that "Offramp" is the album that began this artist's large following. Having been awarded his first Grammy for "Offramp", Metheny alone or with the Group over the next 20 years picked up over a dozen more Grammy's to add to his collection.

With the prominent influence of instrumentalist/percussionist Nana Vasconcelos, the Metheny Group on "Offramp" takes the listener through darkly evocative realms. The studio version of Metheny's now signature concert piece "Are You Going With Me?" is unarguably one of the finest performances of his career. It is almost breathtaking to hear this piece build and build from its simple rhythmic foundations to a seemingly unending series of climaxes. The ethereal "Au Lait" follows and the leads the listener perhaps along a quiet Paris avenue on a sultry summer evening.

The second half of "Offramp" continues the journey at a more structural and upbeat pace. "Eighteen" and "James" are certainly the most mainstream and clearly melodic tracks on the album. Still they do not detract from "Offramp"s very distinctive and textural sound. The album concludes with one of the softest and most haunting pieces Metheny and Mays have ever performed together (again with Nana Vasconcelos). "The Bat Part II" is a reflective and spiritual work, concluding the album literally with the musical equivalent of "amen."

This is a stunningly prolific work...eccentric but still very accessible. It is unfortunate that much of Metheny's later works (produced after his fascinating "Secret Story") did not continue in this adventurous vein.