COMPOSERS: Weather Report
LABELS: Sony
ALBUM TITLE: Forecast: Tomorrow
PERFORMER: Wayne Shorter (sax), Joe Zawinul (keyboards), Jaco Pastorius (bass) etc
There’s not exactly a shortage of available Weather Report material, with two sets of complete CBS albums having been issued in 2012 and 2013 and assorted live dates being released on both CD and DVD by the Art of Groove label. There’s still a place for a collection like this, though, as a relatively compact overview makes for a useful self-contained listening experience. This package is much more of a representative sampling than a ‘greatest hits’ collection, although there are enough of the latter to act as route markers and the inclusion of a few early Zawinul and Shorter solo and sideman tracks is an astute move. The concert DVD is ‘unsurprisingly’ excellent. The 100-page hardback book, that doubles as a library box for the discs, is nicely produced, although both text and photography are a bit bland. The recorded sound, presumably derived from earlier remasterings, can’t be faulted.
Roger Thomas