HR178 - Reginald Taylor - Help Is On The Way - C90 — 1990
Review by Jerry Kranitz
Prior to Help Is On The Way, my only familiarity with Reginald Taylor’s music had been the band The Land Of Guilt & Blarney and as a sometimes member of Alien Planetscapes. So, I was excited about hearing this solo album (Taylor plays all instruments). There’s lots of variety across the 15 untitled and mostly instrumental tracks.
Several tracks are interesting but feel more like ideas Taylor was still fleshing out at the time. The set opens with a strange blend of spacey Caribbean music, Mariachi, and rickety drum machine grooves. This is followed by a noodling yet melodic avant-jazz jam, as if I walked in on a band warming up. I hear guitar, bass, keyboards, and possibly real drums. A later piece features more freeform jazz with tastefully grooving guitar and bass work but also adds an electronica element to the mix. Track 9 is a highlight among the jazz tunes, with its funky strumming and graceful guitar leads. But my favorite is track 6, an electronic orchestral-jazz workout that moves along at a quietly tense pace. It’s one of the more developed and subtly intricate tracks of the set and would make a good background soundtrack piece.
In contrast to the jazz-oriented pieces, track 3 is a devotional melody with vocals that sound like they’re coming from the church balcony. Track 8 is similar though more space-ambient orchestral. Track 7 features psychedelic ambience that jars the listener with abrupt start/stop tape manipulations. Track 11 is a standout, being a fun, oddball hash of circus music that could be the soundtrack to a 1960s comedy film, with a background voiceover reporting on the nation’s deficit. And track 14 is a psychedelic orchestral piece that ebbs and flows between hair-raising delirium and intensely flowing symphonic drone passages.
Prior to Help Is On The Way, my only familiarity with Reginald Taylor’s music had been the band The Land Of Guilt & Blarney and as a sometimes member of Alien Planetscapes. So, I was excited about hearing this solo album (Taylor plays all instruments). There’s lots of variety across the 15 untitled and mostly instrumental tracks.
Several tracks are interesting but feel more like ideas Taylor was still fleshing out at the time. The set opens with a strange blend of spacey Caribbean music, Mariachi, and rickety drum machine grooves. This is followed by a noodling yet melodic avant-jazz jam, as if I walked in on a band warming up. I hear guitar, bass, keyboards, and possibly real drums. A later piece features more freeform jazz with tastefully grooving guitar and bass work but also adds an electronica element to the mix. Track 9 is a highlight among the jazz tunes, with its funky strumming and graceful guitar leads. But my favorite is track 6, an electronic orchestral-jazz workout that moves along at a quietly tense pace. It’s one of the more developed and subtly intricate tracks of the set and would make a good background soundtrack piece.
In contrast to the jazz-oriented pieces, track 3 is a devotional melody with vocals that sound like they’re coming from the church balcony. Track 8 is similar though more space-ambient orchestral. Track 7 features psychedelic ambience that jars the listener with abrupt start/stop tape manipulations. Track 11 is a standout, being a fun, oddball hash of circus music that could be the soundtrack to a 1960s comedy film, with a background voiceover reporting on the nation’s deficit. And track 14 is a psychedelic orchestral piece that ebbs and flows between hair-raising delirium and intensely flowing symphonic drone passages.