Donald Byrd
Stepping Into Tomorrow (Blue Note LA368-G)

Listening to a mid-70s Donald Byrd Blue Note album is like stumbling into a beautiful new world where everything you find offensive somehow takes on the power to soothe you. Closing your eyes, you might think this is highbrow porno music, or reeeeally laid-back groove disco (and if you see the distinction there, you're in the right place).

I think of it as the soundtrack to the best prom ever, and everyone's so high no one cares who spiked the punch.

I assume this one, released in 1975, was the follow-up to Places And Spaces (also from that year, and available on CD). Who was minding the store at Blue Note that they let Donald release two Mizell- produced albums in one year? There was a time when they would shelve perfectly good Art Blakey material! Not to worry, though, it's all good.

While not as bafflingly and/or gloriously out there as Street Lady nor as tightly executed as Places and Spaces, Stepping Into Tomorrow is a solidly listenable album with a few standouts. "Think Twice" is almost a slow jam, and "We're Together" is a good song in itself.

The doo-wop (sendup? tribute? throwback? misfire? classic?) "Rock And Roll Again" is pretty weird when you consider this is the same man that gave us "Cristo Redentor," but in context it completely works.

The album has one tempo, one mood. It's an album for lovin' after midnight or waking up at two in the afternoon, still drunk on the dionysian ether of last night's orgy.

But I don't mean to imply the album is all that sexual … it is in the same way the Song of Solomon is. Spiritually, dig? I just wonder what kind of music they thought they were making.

Loud Bassoon rating scale

Review by Abel Willemena