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In a similar vein, Laura Nyro’s “And When I Die” is over-arranged right into the ground. The over-elaboration of musical ideas make it all sound limp. Now back into the song, the final verse seems - oddly enough - to be lacking in any sense of climax or tension. Hence, coming out of the piano solo we get what sounds like a horn transition, but this only leads to a longer, lush, horn segue, which in turn leads into the real horn transition, which is the already overly elaborate horn intro used at the beginning of the cut. Once having done that, they have to find a way to get back into the rock style of the song in order to end it. After two verses they find their way into a piano solo which involves several changes, several breaks, and which gets farther and farther into a jazz thing. Bobby Colomby’s drumming is particularly at fault: he overplays everything. The verses are done at rushed pace and the rhythm is syncopated so as to fragment the lines of the verse instead of holding them together. The song begins with an over-elaborate horn intro.
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B, S & T have taken the edge off of Traffic’s version. They did the song as a largely straight R & B piece, with Jim Capaldi playing a primitive and simple four beat on drums. “Smiling Phases” is well known as one of Traffic’s finest recordings. I realize that these are harsh criticisms but I think a careful listening to several songs in particular bear them out. Here they are too intent on proving that they can out-do the first album and wind up letting the material manage them. In their first album, B, S & T managed their material (which was - in the form of Kooper’s songs - considerably better than the new material) in a beautiful way. The listener responds to the illusion that he is hearing something new when in fact he is hearing mediocre rock, OK jazz, etc., thrown together in a contrived and purposeless way. The elements of their arrangements often have little musical relationship with each other. Unfortunately, the only result of such an approach can be a pastiche of styles that are fitted together in an artificial way. Perhaps they thought it would be better to maintain the integrity of each style and to combine them without mixing them. Most efforts by musicians to merge varying styles have been more than dismal.
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There is an understandable reason why B, S & T have adopted this approach. Styles exist in tangent on their record, but never merge into one. Ultimately, someone at Columbia will come up with a name for it: “jazz-folk-soul-baroque-C&W-latin-show-tune-rock.” And for once the hyphenated labeling would be appropriate because B, S & T play hyphenated music: first they play folk, then they play jazz, then they play latin, etc. The obvious response is that we are hearing something new: rock being mixed with jazz, rock being mixed with soul, etc. To this day, founding member Bobby Colomby still hand picks the musicians for every tour using his same theory, “Great Musicians Make Great Music.The new Blood, Sweat & Tears album is a perfect example of the rock record that “tries harder.” While at some points on the record the basic style of the group resembles rock and roll, more often the listener is being bombarded with non-rock arranging devices, non-rock solos, and non-rock material, all of which tells him that “something else” is going. The band members are always looking to inspire the next generation of musicians so don’t be shy walk up and talk to them. BS&T still headlines jazz festivals all over the world, but only perform about 60 shows a year so it’s a rare treat to see them live. They are the first rock band to tour behind the former Iron Curtain. BS&T performed on Sunday, Augat Woodstock same day as Jimi Hendrix and other great bands. Other prestigious awards and recognitions include The Playboy Jazz & Pop award, the 1969 album induction into the GRAMMY Hall of Fame, and being named an Honorary Ambassador of Peace for the Republic of Korea. Blood Sweat & Tears went on to receive 10 GRAMMY nominations and won three. That album went on to earn quadruple Platinum status with sales well over four million. The album received the GRAMMY Award for Album of the Year beating out the Beatles’ Abby Road.
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Their second, self-named album was a success, rising to the top of the charts for seven weeks, yielding three top five singles. Fifty years ago, founding member and drummer Bobby Colomby knew they were on the right course and since then, the band has never stopped touring. From the first ensemble in the late sixties practicing in New York’s Greenwich Village while crowds clapped on the street below between songs. Blood, Sweat & Tears is not the first band to ever use a horn section, but they are the first to fuse it with rock, jazz, and some blues thrown in for good measure. None can argue BS&T invented a new style of music.