Stanley Clarke - School Days (1976 Japanese Atlantic Vinyl LP)

Stanley Clarke - School Days | Vinyl LP - 1976 Japanese Warner-Pioneer (Atlantic P-10239A, Pick Up Your Music Series)

• One of the defining jazz-funk albums of the 1970s, featuring the title track's iconic electric bass line, with three different drummers (Steve Gadd, Gerry Brown, Billy Cobham) and guest appearances from John McLaughlin and George Duke
• Clarke's fourth solo album and the peak of his fusion trilogy, released in the same year as Return to Forever's Romantic Warrior, reaching number 2 on the US Jazz Albums chart
• Japanese pressing on Atlantic via Warner-Pioneer, with brass and string arrangements conducted by Clarke himself

The title track of School Days is essentially Stanley Clarke's calling card. The bass line that opens it is one of the most recognisable in fusion, a thumping, percussive figure that Ray Gomez's guitar harmonises over before Clarke takes a four-minute electric bass solo that builds through every technique in his vocabulary. Gerry Brown's drums push hard underneath. David Sancious, who had left Springsteen's E Street Band two years earlier, adds synthesiser and organ across both sides and is Clarke's most consistent foil on the record, his keyboard work filling the space between the bass and guitar on "School Days" and "The Dancer" in a way that keeps the arrangements moving without cluttering them. "Quiet Afternoon" shifts entirely, Clarke switching to acoustic piano and piccolo bass for a smoother, more reflective piece with Steve Gadd on drums. Gadd's brushwork gives the track a different weight from Brown's heavier playing on the surrounding cuts.

Side B opens with "Desert Song", the acoustic centrepiece, where John McLaughlin joins Clarke for rapid-fire duets on acoustic guitar and bowed bass. The interplay resembles McLaughlin's Shakti work from the same period, with Milt Holland's congas and triangle adding percussion underneath. "Hot Fun" is a short, punchy funk piece where the brass and string sections get their biggest moment, the arrangement recalling Earth, Wind and Fire as much as anything from Return to Forever. "Life Is Just a Game" closes the album as a nine-minute orchestral suite and is the only track featuring Billy Cobham on drums and George Duke on keyboards. Clarke plays acoustic bass, electric bass, gong, chimes and adds vocals, the piece building through several distinct sections before a brass-heavy climax. The album was co-produced by Clarke and Ken Scott, who had engineered David Bowie's Ziggy Stardust and Hunky Dory, and remixed at A&M Studios in Los Angeles. This is the 1976 Japanese pressing on Atlantic via Warner-Pioneer Corporation (P-10239A), part of the Pick Up Your Music series. Illustration by Robert Giusti, art direction by Bob Defrin and Lynn Breslin.