East River Drive

About

Albums came less frequently from Stanley Clarke in the 1990s as film scores took up more and more of his time. Not only that, the ideas and functions of film music play a large role in East River Drive, where selections come as often as not in the form of cue-like vamp, as well as two actual themes from Clarke's scores for the films Poetic Justice and Boyz N the Hood. Oddly enough, Clarke's music benefits from his film immersion, for his compositional ideas are sharper and more sophisticated here, and he applies them to a range of electric music idiom. "Zabadoobeebe," "Illegal," and "I'm Home Africa" bear mild African influence, the elegant "Christmas in Rio" has a slight whiff of Brazil, and "Lords of the Low Frequencies" is an extraordinary slap-happy duel between Clarke and fellow virtuoso Armand Sabal-Lecco. As before, Clarke gets help from some of his famous friends -- among them are Gerald Albright, George Howard, Hubert Law, Jean-Luc Ponty, Poncho Sanchez, and the inevitable George Duke -- and he most ably splits the string arranging tasks with George DelBarrio. This is a mature statement from a most accomplished musician, who was still young at 42. Credits Gerald Albright -- Sax (Alto), Sax (Soprano) Ramon Banda -- Percussion Gerry Brown -- Drums Dennis Chambers -- Drums Stanley Clarke -- Arranger, Ba, Producer, Programming, Sequencing, String Arrangement, Tenor Ba, Vocals (Background) Todd Cochrane -- Keyboards David Coleman -- Art Direction George Del Barrio -- Conductor, String Arrangements George Duke -- Keyboard, Piano James Earl -- Bass (Electric) Alexis England -- Vocals (Background) Charles Fambrough -- Ba, Bass (Acoustic) Brian Gardner -- Mastering Caroline Greyshock -- Photography Howard Hewett -- Vocals George Howard -- Ba, Sax (Soprano) Bill Hughes -- Copyist, String Contractor Dan Humann -- Engineer, Mixing Steve Hunt -- Keyboards Darryl Jackson -- Percussion Munyungo Jackson -- Percussion Paul Jackson, Jr. -- Guitar Alphonso Johnson -- Bass (Electric) Deron Johnson -- Keyboards Kenny Kirkland -- Piano Abraham Laboriel, Sr. -- Bass (Electric) Hubert Laws -- Flute Jean-Luc Ponty -- Violin Doc Powell -- Guitar John "J.R." Robinson -- Drums Laura Robinson -- Vocals (Background) Armand Sabal-Lecco -- Bass (Electric), Guitar, Piccolo, Piccolo Ba, Programming, Vocals (Background) Poncho Sanchez -- Conga Allen Sides -- Engineer Bill Summers -- Percussion Steve Sykes -- Engineer, Mixing Anjani Thomas -- Vocals (Background) Michael Thompson -- Guitar, Guitar (Electric) Michael Hart Thompson -- Guitar (Electric) Carlos Vega -- Drums Doug Webb -- Sax (Soprano) .

via Last.fm

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