Talk:Passages (Frank Gambale album)

Genre

As with a few other Gambale albums, there appears to be dispute from one single anonymous user over whether this should be classed as rock (or specifically instrumental rock, since there are no proper vocals) in addition to jazz fusion. Whilst the sources I have provided should already be adequate enough, I nonetheless find it extremely surprising that one can't simply HEAR the obvious rock style with their own ears. To use a few easy examples: the first five tracks "Little Charmer", "6.8 Shaker", "Passages", "White Room" (itself a cover of an established rock song by Cream) and "D-Day" sound like leftover cuts straight off The Great Explorers—they're basic, straightforward rock and hardly sound like fusion at all. Even the crazy shred solos in "Another Alternative" are more akin to rock than jazz. Joe Satriani and Vinnie Moore play the same sort of stuff all the time, and they're considered to be prime instrumental rock. One could almost say the first half of Passages sounds like a Satriani album! Whereas only in the second half does the jazz fusion abruptly pick up again in Gambale's usual style. Granted, there may be a subjective element here (as with all music, to some extent), but disregarding sources and hard print in just this instance, I think it's abundantly clear that this isn't an all-fusion album. I mean, just listen to it—this is Gambale at some of his 'rocking' best. Mac Dreamstate (talk) 10:18, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

Hello, I realize you took out the jazz in the genre box. I too somewhat agree that this album should be labeled with "instrumental rock"; unfortunately I cannot find any sources stating it is instrumental rock. I would like to label this album with "contemporary jazz"; yet there is no Wikipedia page for "contemporary jazz". So I think putting "jazz" should be sufficient enough. This album should be labeled as: Jazz, jazz fusion, instrumental rock, smooth jazz.

I am glad you made the edit on Raison D'etre, I don't know if you've noticed, but allaboutjazz.com is kind of retarded when labeling fusion albums; because they always label it with progressive rock. For some stupid reason they always label all fusion albums as "fusion/progressive rock". They are really stupid, because most fusion albums are not like that. They even labeled Frank's Natural Selection album as "fusion/progressive rock"!: http://www.allaboutjazz.com/php/article.php?id=35622. Obviously, allaboutjazz has some major labeling issues. I bought Raison D'etre a few months ago; and while thoroughly listening to it I was astonished that you thought it deserved the "instrumental rock" treatment. I sounds very jazzy/fusiony. Sprecher (talk)

The first disambiguation article to which contemporary jazz links on Wikipedia is smooth jazz, which has been included. I don't hear any standard jazz here—just fusion, a very small touch of smooth (just barely), and a whole lot of instrumental rock (first five tracks). If we're talking unadulterated jazz, as in the kind found on Raison D'être, Natural High and Natural Selection, then I'll have to strongly disagree about it being used here; let alone being the primary genre, which is completely misleading and false. There's three sufficiently descriptive genres already present, so sticking plain old jazz amongst them goes into cruft territory. Mac Dreamstate (talk) 10:22, 8 March 2011 (UTC)

Unfortunately this album is kind of wierd. The first five songs are like fusion/rock. Then the next six songs are like conemporary jazz/smooth jazz. I know how smooth jazz sounds, and the last six songs are not pure smooth jazz (compare this to typical Kenny G smooth jazz crap). Honestly, it seems that the last six songs are more contemporary jazz than smooth jazz. So, if we could label this album as this then that would be cool: Contemporary/smooth jazz, jazz fusion, instrumental rock. Sprecher (talk) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sprecher (talk • contribs) 01:53, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

It's not that weird. "White Room" is a pure rock song, and the rest of the first five tracks are totally straight-ahead instrumental rock with small dashes of fusion (I've heard Satriani play exactly the same kind of stuff recently). Describe to me how you think they're 50–50 rock/jazz fusion, because you know full well I can come back with a detailed response on how they're not. Everything from track six onwards, however, does indeed switch to jazz fusion and pretty much stays there throughout. Thus we get an album which is about 55–45 jazz fusion/instrumental rock; six tracks to five.

And again, I don't think CD Baby should necessarily be treated as gospel in this case, because this album definitely isn't the same kind of smooth jazz as Note Worker and Thinking Out Loud, nor is it normal jazz like Natural High and Natural Selection. Instrumental rock and jazz fusion cover it sufficiently, whereas contemporary/smooth jazz and normal jazz are completely out of place here. Since the sources primarily state jazz fusion, I'd be happy with labelling the album as "jazz fusion, instrumental rock", but we all know you'll probably disagree with that because after eight months—yes, eight months—you're the only editor on Wikipedia who keeps coming back to edit the articles for Gambale's albums (nobody else's!) with some new agenda. Every... single... time. Even you have to admit how downright laughable that is. Are you related to him or something?

All in all, the main problem I have is labelling this album as normal jazz. This is for three reasons: 1) it is pure and utter cruft to label a single straightforward album with four closely related genres; 2) as with Thinking Out Loud, having three instances of the word "jazz" is overkill; and 3) there is no normal jazz to be found here. Even smooth jazz would seem more warranted, and I'm not exactly keen on that either. So if we take out jazz on its own and end up with "jazz fusion, instrumental rock, smooth jazz", then that's fine... just about. Why put smooth jazz at the end, one may ask? Because it's absolutely minimal at best (which is the whole reason I took out instrumental rock for his first four albums, because there simply wasn't enough of it to warrant its inclusion. The same applies here).

Surely by now you must be getting as sick of typing out the word "jazz" as I am? Thanks to you I've almost become sick of the whole genre! And I mean that in a totally friendly way. Mac Dreamstate (talk) 09:32, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

I'm with you in how we shouldn't always take websites as gospel. Heck, I've seen some major mistakes made on allaboutjazz.com (i.e. Frank's "raison d'etre"). The other thing is that I can't take your thoughts as gospel either. That's why I try to find sources that explain what genre the album really is. The truth is that I have to adhere to the facts presented on well established websites rather than what you think the genre of a particular album is. I have found sources stating "Passages" is fusion, contemporary jazz, and smooth jazz. I have yet to find any sources state that "Passages" is instrumental rock. I do however believe that the first 5 songs are fusion/instrumental rock since a few of these songs are on Frank's rock/fusion album. The next 6 songs are really not even fusion. They are contemporary jazz/smooth jazz songs. Considering most of the album is contemporary jazz/smooth jazz; I think the genre box should read: contemporary/smooth jazz, jazz fusion, instrumental rock.

As for the first five songs being 50% fusion/50% rock, I'm pretty sure that even you'd agree that they are 50/50. First off, never have I heard from anyone or any website state that Passages is instrumental rock. I've been listening to some instrumental rock recently and there are some huge differences between instrumental rock and what Frank presents to us in Passages. The First Five songs would fit easily onto his "Best of Jazz & Rock Fusion". By the way, three of the songs off of Passages are on "Best of Jazz & Rock Fusion" (which you have to remember is a fusion album!). The songs are very fusiony, yet do have the simple cookie cutter feeling of instrumental rock. The songs are also very "slury" which is something that I have yet to hear in instrumental rock; as well as they are not choppy like instrumental rock. The first five songs only have maybe a 50% Satriani flavoring with a 50% Gambale flavoring. I've listened to Satriani and a few of the other instrumental rock greats. They like to distort notes a lot; you can barely even hear the notes clearly. In this album, not only can you hear every note crystal clear, but there is not very much Satriani or Vai distortion (with whom you keep comparing Gambale to), and he plays in a more jazz fusion "slury" manner. That plus the sources is why I think the first 5 songs are fusion/rock. Oh yeah, I am not getting tired of typing out the word "jazz". I love jazz and fusion, so this is actually very enjoyable for me. Sprecher (talk)

*sigh* You know what, I'll just take out standard jazz and we're good. The way it is now is fine. See you in a couple of months when you next have a Frank Gambale agenda—I'm sure you'll enjoy it a whole lot, as usual(!) Mac Dreamstate (talk) 13:03, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

EAR

This article has been the topic of a request at WP:EAR. Please review any advice or comments offered by the EAR team.--Kudpung (talk) 09:40, 19 November 2010 (UTC)

Genre, part 2

So, is it ok if we label this album as contemporary/smooth jazz, jazz fusion? Or, do you still object to the "contemporary" label? Here are my sources: http://www.allmusic.com/album/passages-r203663 http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/FrankGambale6 http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/FrankGambale14 You decide. Sprecher (talk) 01:12, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

I'm fine with labelling it as "Smooth jazz, jazz fusion", as those are the only two genres clearly stated by the sources. However, I do indeed object to having contemporary jazz clumped in there, since none of those sources explicitly state that the album is contemporary jazz. CD Baby lists it solely under smooth jazz (as well as quoting "... [F]irmly in the smooth jazz category"), Allmusic pretty much only says jazz fusion, and the non-related compilation album (appropriately named Best of the Smooth Jazz Side) is also listed only under smooth jazz. Granted, a quote on the latter does say "This wonderful collection spans some 20 years of his finest contemporary jazz music", but it's indirectly talking about a whole bunch of albums. And, like I keep saying, Wikipedia redirects contemporary jazz primarily to smooth jazz, so it's pointless linking to a genre which doesn't even have a full article. Mac Dreamstate (talk) 12:37, 22 March 2011 (UTC)