DRY JACK

The Kansas City-based band Dry Jack were perhaps one of the more obscure ensembles of the late-'70s jazz fusion era. Led by keyboardist Chuck Lamb and his electric bass-playing brother Rich Lamb, the group followed on the heels of Larry Coryell's Eleventh House, Return to Forever, and Weather Report. The quartet, rounded out by electric guitarist Rod Fleeman and drummer John Margolis, was a talented unit, but fairly locked in clichés or stances of their peer-group keyboard heroes à la Chick Corea, Joe Zawinul, and Mike Mandel from the Eleventh House. The music is well played but stuck in a time warp, based on noodling and strictly written charts that have some depth, but mostly flash and chops. In retrospect, Magical Elements holds interest if you pay close attention to the Fender Rhodes playing of Chuck Lamb on pieces like the super hot Brazilian track "Lit Spinners" with Fleeman's dizzying read more...