More Requests: Shakatak - Drivin' Hard (UK 1982), Jan Fryderyk Creative Sound - Faun (Germ 1976), George Otsuka Quintet (Japan 1971 to 1976), Vita Nova (Germ 1971), Odean Pope - Almost Like Me (USA 1982)

 

Information here:

Shakatak is an English jazz-funk band founded in 1980, Drivin' Hard is their first from 1981. It's all instrumental, surprisingly, as you'd expect some vocals on an album like this one from the early part of this commercialocene decade. However, utterly unexpectedly, a tender track called Lumiere sounds like our beloved library genius Alan Hawkshaw with its dreamy, spacey synth line, plus the ocean wave sound that rolls in like a tide halfway through:

For those curious, like myself, the composer is Bill Sharpe, discogged here.

Jan Fryderyk Creative Sound is free jazz with piano and plaintive sax (Alan Skidmore), note the presence of Trilok Gurtu and Peter Giger, seen so often here in the past.

George Otsuka Quintet made 3 albums back in the first part of the 70s. It's basic contemporary quintet jazz (ie trumpet and sax plus the usual) with little fusion for the fusion fan.

Vita Nova is an unreleased band from the early 70s, as per discogs:

An obscure international Munich band, Vita Nova were fronted by guitarist and multi-instrumental Polish born talent Eddy Marron and Hungarian keyboard player Sylvester Levay. They played a complex fusion of classical rock and fusion styles, and aptly in keeping with their name all the lyrics were in Latin. In 1971, This record was only released in a limited private edition of 500 copies.

This album is very typical of the protoprog style of kraut rock with heavy hammond, loud sound, simple chords, bombastic vocals, etc. An unusual feature of this band apart from the Latin lyrics is that it's quite heavy on the percussion, with a couple of drum solos featured. At times they were capable of composing dissonances, as in the Inventions track:

It's important to note that Eddy Marron, of notable Dzyan fame, or rather, 'fame', was in this band. I mentioned him in relation to Family of Percussion here.

Odean Pope (American saxophonist) is for the most part overimprovised free jazz with a couple of songs that cater to more funky commercial tastes, this is the first album from him. So you could say it's a little uneven.