Donald Byrd has been responsible for some fine jazz The Cat Walk and Christo Redentor being two perennial favorites. His Electric album smacks of Miles Davis' current explorations on the surface, but musically it's almost an opposite pole. While Davis deals with space and an occasionally arranged and tightly played by a group of—mostly – New York studio regulars. Some of the arranged parts, as well as some of the improvised ones, are a bit stale, but there is also some fine, moody music that whirls and swirls with the aid of echoplex, electric piano and guitar, and some nice acoustic textures as well.

Airto Moreira, the South American percussionist featured with Davis, contributes some fine work, particularly to his own piece, "Xibaba," the heaviest of the album's four tunes. There is a beautiful south-of-the-border flute solo, in a high mountain vein, by one Hermeto Pascoal, and a fine duet between Moreira and bassist Ron Carter to highlight this track. Byrd is together as usual, lean and simple, never using two notes when he can say it with one. The feeling the album creates is a gentle one — it can be damn pleasant backgound music, since if often doesn't demand total listening in the way Miles does. It's getting quite a lot of airplay, and isn't likely to offend anybody; my own head is into a somewhat harder, more adventurous approach, but some people will really dig it, especially as a mood, a color, an environment.

An interesting note to the trumpet-with-echoplex phenomenon: check out Sun Ra's When Angels Speak Of Love, on Saturn records. Sun, as usual, did it first, several years ago, and some credit is due. (RS 75)

BOB PALMER