Weather Report
started out as a jazz equivalent of what the rock world in 1970 was
calling a "supergroup." But unlike most of the rock supergroups, this
one not only kept going for a good 15 years, it more than lived up to
its billing, practically defining the state of the jazz-rock art
throughout almost all of its run. Weather Report also anticipated and
contributed to the North American interest in world music rhythms and
structures, prodded by keyboardist/co-founder Joe Zawinul.
And WR, like many of jazz's great long-lived groups, proved to be an
incubator for several future leaders who passed in and out of the band
in a never-ending series of revolving-door personnel changes. The
original members of the band were Zawinul, Wayne Shorter (saxophones), Miroslav Vitous (electric bass), Airto Moreira (percussion) and Alphonse Mouzon
(drums), with only Zawinul and (until 1985) Shorter remaining in place
throughout the band's lifespan. Zawinul, Shorter and Moreira all had
experience playing in and influencing the studio and live electric
bands of Miles Davis - and at first, WR was a direct extension of
Miles' In a Silent Way / Bitches Brew period, with free-floating
collective improvisation and interplay, combining elements of jazz,
rock, funk, Latin and other ethnic musics. With the release of
Sweetnighter in 1972, Zawinul's influence upon the band's direction
began to deepen; the groove became more important, structures were
imposed upon the material (though the group continued its freewheeling
interplay in live gigs). When the innovative bassist Jaco Pastorius
replaced Alphonso Johnson in 1976, WR entered its most popular phase,
with Pastorius becoming a flamboyant third lead voice, Shorter's sax
receding into more epigrammatic form, and Zawinul rediscovering his
commercial touch and sharpening his electronic sophistication. The
best-selling Heavy Weather album (1977) actually served up a hit song
that became a jazz standard ("Birdland"), and with the entry of Peter Erskine
on drums (1978), the group finally had a stable lineup for awhile.
Contrary to accepted wisdom, the departures of Pastorius and Erskine in
1982 led to a recharging of WR's batteries; their replacements Victor Bailey (bass), Omar Hakim (drums), Jose Rossy and later, Mino Cinelu
(percussion) were more amenable to Zawinul's deepening inclinations for
Third World rhythms, sounds and textures. This edition of WR rattled
off three more albums, including the outstanding Procession. But
Shorter, who had gradually ceded nearly total artistic control to
Zawinul, was getting restless; he took a leave of absence in 1985 and
later that year, left WR for good. This Is This (1985), in which
Erskine returns and Shorter plays only a limited role, was WR's swan
song. Zawinul would tour in 1986 with a revamped version called Weather
Update (a prelude to the keyboardist's own Zawinul Syndicate), and
there was talk in 1996 about Zawinul and Shorter reuniting in the
studio for a new edition of WR, but Zawinul later deflated the
speculation.