Dharma - Archipel (limited time only)

At last we can complete the discography of this famous French free jazz-fusion band, who made I guess 4 records back in the day.  Guitarist Gerard Marais appeared on one of the albums (not this one) and was featured here on this blog in the past (in several places actually).  The other members are Gérard Coppéré, Jacques Mahieux, Jeff Sicard, Michel Gladieux, and Patricio Villaroel.  It's likely some of these have appeared here before, given the way this blog and the seventies fusion/jazz scene work.  I can't say I have the energy to check after hearing this one out.

All their albums are a little difficult to approach and feature those super-long solo parts that drive me nuts, cf. the Nordic Jazz group that featured Scandinavian players who made a point of never, ever, improvising stoned, unfortunately (as you can see from the comments section).  The first track:





I'm going to assume everyone already has the other albums, maybe not the Colette Magny collaboration, but here they all are in one grouping, limited time, as this record was reissued recently, knock yourselves out...

Osiris - In the Mists of Time (Japan, 1980)

I am not sure how useful the information sheet is above.
The discogs information reveals:

Hiro Kawahara's pre-Heretic band. Many other recordings were also released on cassette between 1978-1982, under the names of Osiris, Astral Temple and Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde. These are all hopelessly obscure and impossible to find.

This is pretty lovely electronic music that resembles such priceless French forerunners as Fondation, which brings back fond memories of those glory days of the mutantsounds blog, mixing guitars and synths in instrumental passages that are all evocative in unique ways.  Also welcome is the way the artist does short songs, like German Entrance the Pond, rather than the usual monotony of sidelong drony exercises in one-chord endurance.  I mean, I would find running a half marathon tiring, but listening to one C minor chord for twenty minutes is more exhausting than three consecutive full marathons back to back.  In fact I don't think I've ever undergone that particular form of 'enhanced interrogation' as the CIA calls it.  Like I've said before, I suspect often the artist fell asleep at his keyboard with his left hand still on the same chord, from boredom, of course. Anyways, this one is not like that at all.
First track:

I Gres, 3 library albums

Looking at the covers, again memories of those stamp collections of my childhood where the same design was replicated in multiple colours we collected... why? knowing that stamps would be useless, 40 years later, in adulthood?  Like so many dumb artefacts of our lives today we treasure will be useless in a few years?

I am not sure how familiar people out there are with these guys, but I didn't know them until my friend sent these and once again, shocking how much great music library composers put into these apparently disposable, for the nonce, little records.  Kind of like cellphones today. 
Just consider the wonderful dynamics of the opener of the first installment, called Restless:

From the third installment, on Remembering an artificial (digital) cello adds great atmosphere:



From discogs:


Italian four-member library music group, consisting of Giorgio Carnini, Roberto Pregadio, Enzo Restuccia and Silvano Chimenti.

How enjoyable.

Paul Zaza, 1977

Hoping to spend some isolating time hiding away from corona by ripping requests I was instead disappointed to find the international postal system slowed down with delays and cancellations with dozens of records that have been stuck for weeks in some warehouse limbo.  Now I have to go back to some old stuff that's been kickin' around for a while.  This is an artist who is well known career wise but whose earlier works are not.  From discogs:

Canadian musician, producer, engineer and film music composer
Began his career as a classically trained pianist.
Played bass with the hit musical "Hair" and toured with the The Fifth Dimension in the 1970s. Founded Toronto studio Zaza Sound Productions in the early 1970s, and his label : Zaza Records (2).
After establishing himself in the world of film and television scoring, Zaza has over 175 feature films, television series and specials to date to his credit, including "Porky's", "Meatballs III", "A Christmas Story", "Prom Night", "Derby", "Baby Geniuses", "Murder By Decree", "The Fourth Angel" and "Grizzly Falls".
He is the recipient of many Film and Television Awards including Canada's prestigious Genie Award as well as fourteen SOCAN awards.

Information here.  You can see he made a lot of different stuff, including library records, soul, disco, and this pop-fusion opus in 1977 which is quite listenable and enjoyable.  Ridin High has such a nice Trower sound to it:

Completely different is his orchestral stuff.  I added a nice Parry Sound library record which featured some compositions by Zaza, called Bright and Breezy.  His Flight to the Sun is classic 70s chord changes and patterns:

Frank Sanchez, 1983

A very similar album to the Stosic with a bit more baritone, Las Vegas style to it, also Xian.

I can do anything: