A friend of mine recently started University and, in a recent epistle, mentioned that he was listening to a brilliant jazz fusion album. I couldn’t resist asking what although I expected the answer would be something I’d never heard of since I’m so old.

Long-in-the-tooth readers may have guessed from the title of this post that it turned out to be Weather Report. I’m pretty familiar with the band’s output from the late-70’s period when Jaco Pastorius held the bass chair but it turns out that he was listening to Mysterious Traveller (1974), which was a pre-Jaco release – mainly supported by Alphonso although with founding member, Miroslav Vitouš, on one of the tracks.

The prevalence of streaming services, like Spotify, do pose significant challenges to the way the music industry used to work but it does mean I can immediately start running the album past my ears. And, yes, it turns out to be an extraordinary piece of work. I might even add it to my Christmas list!