Track Listing

1. Tell Me What To Do
2. Los Conquistadores Chocolates
3. Lost On 23rd Street
4. Fantasy
5. Shifting Gears
6. Can't We Smile

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #397592 in Music
• Released on: 1997-05-12
• Number of discs: 1

Customer Reviews

A Jazz-Funk classic
Well, would you believe it, a rather well respected historian / journalist called Scott Yanow, rated this 1 and a half stars out of five on the AMG website (a great source of music info.). This has drove me to write this review. This album may be rough around the edges but the guts of the thing is jazz funk at it's absolute best (highlights being Gears, Fantasy and Los conquistadores chocolates). These songs appear time after time on compilation albums and in clubland due to the sheer funk/dance groove (and that great Hammond Organ!). The fundamental flaw in the AMG rating is they have let a jazz purist review this album.

The ultimate veteran Jazz Funkers dance album
What a treat it was to have this jewel from a time less era released on CD. this gem which has entered it,s third decade now .Worn copies of this album have been played in the jazz funk clubs for decades and in 2000 , the classic Mazell production sounds fresher than it ever did prior to it,s release in the seventies. Hammond has excelled his instrumental talents on this red hot jazzy dance floor sizzler. Without a doubt Johny Hammonds Gears is one of the most irresistable off the wall club albums. A classic winner.

Sky high Mizell magic
A timeless and spellbinding album from 1975, written and produced by the legendary Larry & Fonce Mizell and starring jazz keyboardist Johnny Hammond.

"Gears" blends the trademark Mizell sound - that kind of multi-layered, yin/yang balance of soaring, string-laden, spaced-out disco music floating high over complex, funky rhythms - with Hammond's driving, jazzy piano and B3 organ.

Literally every track is great but "Fantasy" is sailing so close to absolute musical perfection that it shines out like a beacon. It opens with a funky drum beat, followed by a chunky bass riff and then staccato stabs of guitar. This is then rapidly augmented by a cascade of light, circular rhythm guitar and piano. As the pace quickens, waves of solo instruments appear in the mix - notably the flute and a strange bluesy violin sound. Towards the end, Hammond exchanges piano for the B3 organ and rides the rhythm to its close. I first heard this song about 20 years ago - I was stunned by it then and it has never lost its potency.

Whilst I have singled out "Fantasy" as the star of the show, I feel almost equally passionate about "Los Conquistadores Chocolates". Featuring Hammond on the B3 again, it has a similar spacey (europhic?) mood but with a faster tempo and is probably even more spaced-out. It is so full of lightness and free space that, for me, it always evokes the sensation of flying. (However, the strange minute-and-a-half long introduction before the rhythm kicks in was a mistake in my book!)

"Shifting Gears" is much funkier. Of Bobbi Humphrey's "Blacks & Blues" (another different but equally brilliant Mizell production), one Amazon reviewer described the sound as "pimpish" and this song also fits that bill, brimming as it is with potent hip hop breakbeats and blaxpolitation-like cinematic imagery. You can probably deduce from the title what happens during the song and there are indeed several `gear' or tempo changes, suggesting the sensations aroused by controlling the speed of a fast car. I also love Fonce Mizells's funky clavinet that kicks in about half way. "Tell Me What to Do" has a similar sound but this time with a jerky, stop-start rhythm and some gorgeous, soaring trombone.

The other two tracks, "Can't We Smile" and "Lost on 23rd Street" are a much slower tempo, almost ballads and quite reminiscent of those big, funky orchestral songs by Love Unlimited. I prefer the four up-tempo numbers but, such is the genius of the production team, these two are far from being album fillers.

This is a shockingly great album.