dreadpirateroberts 'Deodato 2' the follow-up to 'Prelude' follows a similar path to its predecessor.

Which is both a strength and a weakness. The album has the same laid back feel, the same classical reworkings and employees a similar cast (who are still in fine form) but adds a funkier approach to many songs. When taken as a whole it is perhaps a collection of less memorable material, but is hardly unsuccessful.

The CD reissue messes with the original running order, placing the sometimes effective Moody Blues cover as opener and following with Ravel's 'Pavane For A Dead Princess.' It's a slower and delicate perhaps, than the original (and I do miss the more typical brass) but represents a point in the album where Deodato strays a little from the territory covered on the previous album.

Unlike 'Rhapsody In Blue' which treads very closely to what was achieved with 'Also Sprach...' and is not as effective second time around. What does work better on '2', is kicking the up the funk another gear for 'Super Strut' which is probably the best cut on the record and a fantastic opener to the LP. There's pretty much no way to get tired of Clarke's bass line and everyone else seems to be having a blast, whether it's Deodato's solos, Cobham's high quality drumming or Tropea's guitar.

There's every chance you'll enjoy this album if you liked 'Prelude' but you wont see any massive diversions in sound or material, which isn't always a bad thing - everything still sounds great, I'm really only giving it three stars because it covers similar ground, and not because of any huge deficiencies in the recording, playing or arrangements.

Sean Trane After the timeless classic album of Prelude, the next album came as simply called 2, but it’s rather deceiving, since Eumur Deodato had a 60’s career as a samba and bossa artiste. But what we as a site are looking at are these wild JR/F albums that the Brazilian released in the most essential year of musical freedom, the early 70’s. And just like Prelude, 2 repeats the formula of mixing some awesomely arranged covers like Moody’s Nights In White Satin, Gershwin’s Rhapsody In Blue and Steely Dan’s Do It Again and a bunch of often torrid self-penned jazz-rock-fusion compositions. Some of the JR/F giants are present like Cobham, Clarke, but there are two dozens no-less deserving lesser-known musos as well, including large brass and string sections. As is usually the case with all of those killer JR/F essential albums from that classic era, this was again on the Columbia label

Starting on the 9-mins+ 100MPH Super strut funk-fusion piece, complete with a fuzzed-out guitar solo, courtesy of the relative unknown John Tropea, but shinning all the way through the album; the rest of the A-side glides smoothly on the best known Gershwin piece giving it the full works mixing strings and jazz-rock instrumentation and later on a brassy bluesy rendition of the classic Moodies hit. If the former takes an attentive ear to recognize the original piece, the latter is instantly recognizable. The A-side closes on a rearranged version of Ravel’s Pavane For A Dead Princess, which is a little too cheesy and slow for my tastes.

Opening the flipside is a superb 150MPH Skyscrapers fusion piece, where you can find Eumur’s Hammer-Corea influences on synths, followed by a sitar-sounding guitar leading Latin Flute track and a much slower (and cheesy) Venus piece. Closing off the debate is a rather cool and swingy instrumental version of Steely Dan’s first mega-hit Do It Again, just as good as the original. Definitely a worthy follower to Deodato’s previous album, but with slightly less merits since the formula of the former is mostly repeated without much variation.