75

This is a fantastic album, showcasing how Joe Zawinul kept pushing to the very end of his life. Not content to rest on his many laurels, he created a world-hybrid that is more true "world" than 99% of what's being labeled as world-music. His shows were magical too and these performances are taken from live shows. The highlight is of course the duo between Wayne Shorter & Joe Zawinul…utterly haunting and captivating by these 2 geniuses who had such incredible rapport and history together.

I have had the great privledge to see Joe play with Cannonball and Miles, Weather Report and Syndicate.... There is a great emptiness in the world of music with Joe's passing. I have all his records and this is as great as all the others. The energy, focus, the layer upon layer of sounds, words, rythms.... To see him live was a peak experience... You were never the same when you walk out of one of his concerts... This album deserves it's place along side of his other overwhelming excellent albums.... Good by Joe, how you will be missed......

This is a great memorial to an amazing and important musician. It isn't the best collection of his music (Check out WDR's Brown Street), but it is magical in that it is a fun listen and was recorded in the last year of his life. I had the joy to see this band that year and it was my lifetime's musical highlight.

I love Joe Zawinul, especially during his Weather Report & Miles Davis years. I am a fan, but I have very mixed feelings about the overall production quality of this album. For starters, most of the tracks sound like reissues of old Joe Zawinul masterpieces with the Weather Report band. I have the originals (vinyls and cds) and any reissue of the original tracks are a waste of musical resources. I was hoping to hear a seventy-five year old Joe Zawinul doing (live or studio recorded) fresh takes on his original classics. I know his music very well and know many of the tracks were pulled from the vaults and laid down on the compact discs. If you have never heard any of the original Zawinul bands, then maybe the tracks may provide you with enough incentive to check out other recordings of Weather Report and Miles Davis. Otherwise, I do not think I would recommend this offering. It's not the music, but the bad idea of the recording studio to just dust of some old gems and put them together for a seventy-fifth anniversary album. Sorry....