Track Listing

1. Police People
2. All of Us
3. Good Life
4. Word From Bird
5. Compute
6. Veil
7. Song X
8. Mob Job
9. Endangered Species
10. Video Games
11. Kathelin Gray
12. Trigonometry
13. Song X Duo
14. Long Time No See

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #112235 in Music
• Released on: 2005-10-03
• Number of discs: 1

Album Description
This updated version of Song X is truly a breathtaking expansion of the original work, opening with six unreleased tracks from the original sessions. Bassist Charlie Haden, who had previously recorded individually with Coleman and Metheny, had brought the pair together, and he's featured on Song X, along with drummer Jack DeJohnette and percussionist Denardo Coleman, Ornette's son. With this new edition of Song X, Metheny pauses to look back at his impressive catalogue while continuing to move forward in unexpected new directions.

Amazon.com
The Texas-born alto saxophonist, composer, and free jazz pioneer Ornette Coleman influenced generations of musicians, including a guitarist from Missouri named Pat Metheny. Two decades after their 1985 recording, this remastered and remixed edition – with Coleman’s son Denardo and Jack DeJohnette both on drums, with long time bassist Charlie Haden – sounds fresher than ever. The original eight tracks, from the bluesy, midtempo "Mob Job," laced with Coleman’s eerie violin strains, and the crying ballad "Kathelin Gray" to the interlocking title track, all exhibit the quantum physics approach to melody, rhythm, harmony and improvisation Coleman calls Harmolodics. The additional, six unreleased selections from the Coleman canon include "The Good Life," a Latin-tinged number, the hyper-bopped "Word From Bird," Compute," and the melodically dark shadows of "The Veil." As Metheny wrote in the liner notes, "This twentieth-anniversary edition of record feels like an improvement and reveals a more complete picture of our efforts."--Eugene Holley, Jr.

Customer Reviews

Has to be one of the best releases in the 80's
First of all, this is a dream team group, Ornette Coleman and his original bassist Charlie Haden, with drummer extrodinare Jack Dejohnette, with Guitarist Pat Metheny, and Ornette's son on percussion. What comes out of the grooves is usually suprisingly fun and melodic, although sometimes brilliantly chaotic. This is a great introduction to Ornette's vision...

XX Has It Been 20 Years All Ready?
I bought this on LP when it came out in 1986. When that record wore out,I got it on cassette. When that cassette stretched out and ripped in two,I bought in on cd. Here I am listening to it on this new cd edition.
If you have SONG X,but don't have SONG XX,then you DON'T have SONG X.
Thank you Pat for putting this exiting,new,& FRESH cd out. The 6 NEW TUNES (to me) are so great,they really complete the session.
There is an AIR,a kind of SPACE,a stirring kind of ROOM SOUND to this recording that makes you feel like your lucky enough to be right there at POWER STATION with them.
THIS CD IS INCREDABLE,I'M FREAKING OUT!!!!!

Rich, exciting. but NOT BACKGROUND MUSIC. Got to listen.
I love this album. It crosses both musical and social boundaries.
Although Ornetted Coleman's music appears to be an "acquired taste". I feel that, like Ligeti, Messiaen or Lutoslawski, the taste is worth acquiring for the reward it returns. This is a good example. It may take the usual Metheny fan out of his/her comfort zone for a bit, but if you hang in, that comfort zone might expand quickly into an energy zone. The unusual Metheny fan knows that Pat Metheny does occasionally stretch out like this. He does it well, too.
For the usual Coleman fan: If you enjoyed "Dancing In Your Head" and "Beauty Is a Rare Thing", this one may just lift you out of yourself for a while. But please - try to listen undistracted.