Weather Report's biggest-selling album is that ideal thing, a popular and artistic success and for the same reasons. Released just as the jazz-rock movement began to run out of steam, this landmark album proved that there was plenty of creative life left in the idiom. This powerhouse supergroup, comprised of Joe Zawinul, Jaco Pastorius, Wayne Shorter, Alex Acuna and Manolo Badrena, delivered their only certified-Platinum release with this killer cut. This vinyl release is 180 gram.

An absolute fusion classic, this is the album that put Weather Report (featuring Joe Zawinul, Wayne Shorter, Jaco Pastorius, Alex Acuna and Manolo Badrena) on the map! Part of Sony's Jazz Masterpiece reissue series, this album (containing the smash hit "Birdland") features great new sound via 20-bit digital remastering.

REVIEW:

Weather Report's biggest-selling album is that ideal thing, a popular and artistic success -- and for the same reasons. For one thing, Joe Zawinul revealed an unexpectedly potent commercial streak for the first time since his Cannonball Adderley days, contributing what has become a perennial hit, "Birdland." Indeed, "Birdland" is a remarkable bit of record-making, a unified, ever-developing piece of music that evokes, without in any way imitating, a joyous evening on 52nd St. with a big band. Wayne Shorter's saxophones are now reticent, if always eloquent, beams of light in Zawinul's general scheme while Alex Acuña shifts ably over to the drums and Manolo Badrena handles the percussion. Released just as the jazz-rock movement began to run out of steam, this landmark album proved that there was plenty of creative life left in the idiom.

-- AllMusic.com

By September of 1978 Weather Report's headlining status afforded them the opportunity to play a very long set amounting to two hours in length. Given the previous year's success with the poll winning "Heavy Weather" album one might have expected them to concentrate on this more or less exclusively, but instead, fans were treated to material from right across the bands career and solo spots by everybody. "Black Market" opens this concert and straight away it's apparent that the energy level is high and the relaxed pace of the studio version has been superseded by a slightly faster tempo. An explosive tenor and drum duet by Shorter and Erskine also forms part of this and must have surely put an end to the feeling in some quarters at the time that the saxophonist was no longer at his best. Also on board were flamboyant electric bassist Jaco Pastorius, a genuine innovator, and newly arrived drummer Peter Erskine a master technician brought into the group to add more of a jazz feel. Joe Zawinul was keen to stress that Weather Report's music was their music, a product of the group's identity, and not simply jazz-rock akin to that of many bands of the time. Although he was known for his strong opinions it's clear that no other group mixed improvisation, formal structures and electronics quite like them. One night in Germany is clear proof of this

2007 five CD set, a great installment in Sony/BMG's Original Album Classics series that brings together rare and out of print titles with some best sellers from the Sony/BMG Jazz catalog. Many of these albums have been unavailable on CD for some time and are sought after by collectors. Each set is presented in a high quality, rigid cardboard slipcase containing five 'vinyl replica' mini LP sleeves. This collection from the Jazz fusion greats features the albums I Sing the Body Electric, Sweetnighter, Mysterious Traveller, Black Market and Night Passage.

Weather Report was one of the super-bands in the 70s and beginning of the 80s. The 40th anniversary of the founding of the band, which was started by the legendary keyboarder Joe Zawinul and the saxophonist Wayne Shorter, occurs now in a fine remastered vinyl. The concert the band gave at the Berliner Jazztage in 1975 can be heard for the first time on: The band gave a fantastic performance including Mysterious Traveller, Scarlet Woman And Badia/Boogie Woogie Waltz from among the earlier weather report hits.

To celebrate the 40th "birthday" of one of the world's best bands - Weather Report - the label Art of Groove is releasing the band's Rockpalast concert in Cologne 1983 - a premiere on CD and DVD. What a feast the concert was for the Colognials that night, and is now for us all these years later. As Omar Hakim has said: "Weather Report wasn't typical instrumental music: there was Europe, Africa, jazz, blues, Latin, all inside one thing. It was true world music...". Here's to that ! After Jaco Pastorius and Peter Erskine left the band, Joe Zawinul and Wayne Shorter decided to continue their successful project with a new rhythm set: drummer Omar Hakim, Victor Bailey on bass and percussionist Jose Rossy. For Bailey and Hakim it was the starting point of their international career. Weather Report's Cologne concert shows the band in musical top form. In a more than two-hour show, the band sparks a firework of rhythm and melodies. Next to classics like "Birdland," in this concert you will hear pieces from later phase of Weather Report: "D Flat Waltz," "Procession," "Fast City," "Where The Moon Goes" and "Two Lines". The material which was originally recorded by the WDR (West German Radio and Television Broadcasting)has been completely restored and re-mastered and is now appearing in a new version - something that's not just for long-time fans of Weather Report