Where We Come From

Where We Come From, the 1998 release from Frank Gambale, Steve Smith and the rest of Vital Information, features modern electric jazz and the funky soul of the '60s fused into a rollicking trip down memory lane. One of the ideas for this project was. "What if the group went back to the late '60s and early '70s when electric jazz was just getting started and altered the recipe a little bit? Keeping some of the main ingredients that the early 'fusion' pioneers used; blues, be bop, modal jazz, R&B and rock, but adding a dose of New Orleans, Memphis, James Brown, Ornette Coleman, Jimmy Smith and a pinch of surf music." Gambale explores the nuances of his hollow body George Benson Ibanez guitar on every tune and gets into his own blues, country, rock and surf roots, while keyboardist Tom Coster dusts off his Hammond B-3, his old Rhodes and... his accordian. Bassist Jeff Andrews used his upright on as many of the tunes as appropriate, and for electric bass, he decided to go with his four-string Fender style Yamaha, feeling it would be more in keeping with the new (old) concept of the the album, rather than the five- or six-string basses he had been using.