"Parallel Realities" was a project band led by the American jazz drummer, pianist, and composer, Jack Dejohnette from 1990 to 1991. Apparently, Jack had an album contract with MCA. He wanted to finish it by recording an album and this all-star super group's following live concert tour. I've always loved Pat Metheny's dream-like horn sound on his “red one”, Roland G-303 guitar synth, and Herbie Hancock's synth sound that reminds me of Miles' harmon mute trumpet in this composition of Jack Dejohnette, "Jack In." There were several guitarists like John McLaughlin and John Abercrombie who tried to use guitar synths in the '80s jazz scene, but Pat is the only one who has used it most extensively and musically with his signature sound until today. Pat and Herbie performed sophisticated solos on Dave Holand's electric slap bass and jack's powerful touch with their tight groove in this tune. However, the most amazing thing in this tune is the cutting-edge style of compositional structure and unusual chord progressions. It's not easy at all to play a solo on this kind of unique changes as it sounds, without having a compositional mind. "Parallel Harmony" in music is also known as "Harmonic Parallelism" or "Harmonic Planing." It means parallel movements of two or more lines in voice leading. It was originated from the French Impressionism, which regarded harmonic progression and target points as temporary objects, rather than typical flows of the expected major/minor cadences or punctuations. In this tune, after the initial big “announcement,” on the intro, there's the first A theme, which is composed of sweet pop melodies upon the intro piano riff. Then it goes to the contrastive B theme with Pat's advanced chromatic melody line and modal harmony on the tight rhythm section. Then the transitional bridge, C theme, is kind of extension of the previous B section, but less intense and more like a loose solo section based on a Caribbean groove. After Pat played a beautiful and emotional melodic solo on A, the tune goes into the dark and deep primary bridge, D section with Herbie's lead synth solo. Eventually, it reaches the big announcement again. It comes back to the sweet A theme as a "head out" signal and surprisingly ends up with Pat’s chromatic/modal solo on the B section. That is such an unexpected and cool "post-modern" style ending. It has both friendly pop and experimental avant-garde jazz sides, which made their music accessible and also adventurous to anyone who tried to join with. I respect the great efforts of contemporary jazz musicians like this in the '80s and '90s always.
Missing the amazing piano solo on the studio version but this ROCKS! What a stellar combo. Herbie goes crazy on the piano in the mid-section on the studio version - I encourage anyone who likes this vid to purchase Parallel Realities - the entire album is amazing and you will not be disappointed.
Was ,Blessed to see these Guys in N.Y. -Jazz Fest. Was ,with some dude, Steve Smith ,standing in Wings not far away from Jack. A ,night never forgotten. Jack and Band blew the doors off the Heavens . Steve ,was blown away by Jack ..Ha.....
Yes that's definitely true, but since then it's been so common to see a double bass by his side that it's unusual to see him with a bass guitar slung over his shoulder :)
One of the few tracks that actually sounds better then the original studio version and Pat Metheny is just absolutely on fire here in fact everyone here are all on their 'A' game. It doesn't get any better than these guys.
As +B Luc says, it's a guitar synth unit, but it's unlike a lot of modern guitar synth stuff. It's more of an adaptive analog + digital thing, but it doesn't do pitch-to-MIDI or pitch-to-voltage conversion. It ends up having some real quirks (which doomed the thing in the market), but Metheny exploited these quirks to the max and ended up getting such great expressiveness out of the thing. There are modern Roland/BOSS units that will do GR-300 emulations, so do check those out if you're looking to cop this tone.
Fine musicians playing fine music, but when it comes to the use of GR-300 Roland guitar synthesizer the only musician who made true justice to it, was Robert Fripp.
Pat use the guitar sound , so specific , his new sound, but not in the best way ... Mon anglais n est pas genial , mais enfin ... Il cherche un public plus jeune et il va le trouver , avec sa formation Lyle Mays etc ... Merci infiniment pour le morceau Paris0820
