Jan Akkerman & Kaz Lux (Jan Akkerman Related)

Jan Akkerman & Kaz Lux - Transparental - 1980 - Polydor

Dutch guitar legend Jan Akkerman, has done almost anything a musician could possibly do. He has worked with musicians like BB King, Charlie Byrd, Cozy Powell, Claus Ogerman and Ice-T, besides being a former member of the internationally acclaimed Brainbox and Focus bands. Jan has recorded more than a dozen solo records that shows his versatile playing without any limitations or boundaries . He explores and combines elements of rock, jazz, blues, as well as classical or modern dance music and gives them his own unique stamp. On stage, Jan Akkerman has toured all around the world. Besides several appearances at the Swiss Montreux Jazz Festival, the Dutch North Sea Jazz Festival, his countless tours around theatres and different stages, he has also performed in countries like Japan, Russia, North & South America and Australia. He has a long-time fan base in many parts of the world. In his own country, he received a Golden Harp in 2005 for his substantial body of work and again gained recognition for his distinctive role in guitar music by many people. "Transparental" is a short album which has received mostly poor reviews. In 1977, Jan Akkerman & Kaz Lux made a duo album for the first time. The album, "Eli" was a good solid album with good songs, and some beautiful Akkerkman guitar. It was recorded with Pierre van der Linden (ex-Brainbox, ex-Focus, ex-Trace) and Rick van der Linden (ex-Ekseption, ex-Trace). "Transparental" was recorded with Kaz Lux, Cees Van Der Laarse, Pierre Van Der Linden, Rick Van Der Linden, Manuel Lopez, Eddy Conrad, and Grace Van Der Laarse; all brilliant musicians in their own right, but the album is arguably not as inventive an album as "Eli". The first two tracks are good. "Marcha" is a nice ballad, but "You're Not The Type", and the reggaefied "The Party Is Over" are not up to Jan Akkerman's usual very high standard. It's probably unfair to compare the two albums, and possibly many people expect brilliance on every Jan Akkerman recording, which is never going to happen with any artist. There is still the great bluesy voice of Kaz Lux and some great solos by Jan Akkerman. As stated before on this blog, the terms, world's greatest guitarist, best guitarist of all time, etc, etc, are "bandied" around a lot. However if we take some of the definitions of great, like "of outstanding significance or importance", "superior in quality or character", "powerful; influential", or "remarkable or out of the ordinary in degree or magnitude or effect", then Jan Akkerman is truly a great guitarist, as all the aforementioned definitions apply to Jan's playing. "Transparental" is a good, funky album, and if you like Jan Akkerman, you will probably like the album. Please excuse the "Snap, Crackle and Pop"on the album. Listen to the Jan Akkerman & Kaz Lux "Eli" album. Try and find Brainbox's "To You" album featuring the two musicians. Kaz Lux Band's "Instructions" is a great album. Jan's "Profile", and the outstanding "Focus Live At The Rainbow" albums should be heard by everybody. Search this blog for more Jan Akkerman related releases

TRACKS / COMPOSERS

A1 Inspiration - Jan Akkerman/Kazimierz Lux 6:20
A2 Apocalypso - Jan Akkerman/Kazimierz Lux 6:35
A3 Concentrate, Don't Hesitate - Jan Akkerman/Kazimierz Lux 6:53
A4 Transparental - Jan Akkerman 1:10

B1 I Don't Take It Much Longer - Jan Akkerman/Kazimierz Lux 3:55
B2 Marscha - Kazimierz Lux 5:20
B3 You're Not The Type - Jan Akkerman/Kazimierz Lux 6:05
B4 The Party Is Over - Jan Akkerman/Kazimierz Lux 4:40

N.B: Please read comments regarding a correction in the track info for this album

MUSICIANS

Guitar - Jan Akkerman
Vocals, Guitar - Kaz Lux
Bass - Cees Van Der Laarse
Drums - Pierre Van Der Linden; Manuel Lopez on "Marscha", and "The Party Is Over"
Percussion - Eddy Conrad , Grace Van Der Laarse
Keyboards - Rick Van Der Linden

ABOUT KAZ LUX

In the late 60's a young man with a polish father, Kasimirz (or Kaz) Lux starts singing in several bands and starts writing his own material. In 1968 he enters a talent scouting and wins. The first prize is to record a demo for the Bovema label. Because the producers aren't much impressed by his fellow band mates, they suggest he records the demo with the help of studio musicians. Here he meets guitarist Jan Akkerman, drummer Pierre van der Linden (who also played in After Tea) and pianist Wim Jongbloed. Because Lux didn't like the playing of Jongbloed, he asked Rob Hoeke. In the recording session they recorded two songs: Down man and Woman's gone. Akkerman played the bass guitar during the session. Only the second track survived. A few months later Lux is asked by Akkerman and Van der Linden to form a band. As a bass player they recruit Andre Reynen, as was suggested by their manager, John van Setten. And so Brainbox is started. When Brainbox is disbanded Kaz Lux starts a solo career. His first album is released in 1972 and a few more in the years to come. In 1976 he teams up with Jan Akkerman again to make an album together, Eli. Among the other musicians are former Ekseption and Trace keyboard player Rick van der Linden and ex-Brainbox, ex-Focus and ex-Trace drummer Pierre van der Linden. The album becomes a success. In 1980 Akkerman and Lux make another album together, Transparental. Again musical help is provided by the two van der Lindens. In the following years Kaz Lux participates in several reforms of Brainbox (these times without Jan Akkerman) and is also singer in the band Flavium, besides of his solo career.

ABOUT JAN AKKERMAN

A musician of nearly legendary prowess, Jan Akkerman for a time eclipsed Eric Clapton, Jimmy Page, and Jeff Beck among reader polls in England as the top guitarist in the world. Akkerman was born in Amsterdam, Holland, and showed his musical inclinations early, taking up the guitar while still in grade school. His taste and interests were extraordinarily wide-ranging, from pop/rock to classical, with room for blues, Latin, and other influences. He joined his first band, Johnny & His Cellar Rockers, in 1958, at age 11, which included his boyhood friend Pierre van der Linden on drums. Later on, the two were members of the Hunters, an instrumental group whose sound was heavily influenced by that of the Shadows. He acquired a special interest in the lute while on a visit to England during the mid-'60s, during which he saw a performance by legendary classical guitarist Julian Bream, whose repertoire of medieval works also fascinated Akkerman. This interest, which broadened to embrace a fixation on medieval England and its countryside, later manifested itself in such works as "Elspeth of Nottingham" from Focus III. During the late '60s, Akkerman, van der Linden, bassist Bert Ruiter, and singer Kaz Lux formed Brainbox, who were good enough to get a recording contract with Parlophone Records. He was involved with an early incarnation of the group Focus, founded by conservatory-trained flutist Thijs Van Leer, but didn't join until after that group had issued its unsuccessful debut album — he took Van der Linden with him from Brainbox and, with Van Leer and bassist Cyril Havermans (later succeeded by Ruiter) from the original Focus, formed a new group of that name. With Akkerman's virtuoso guitar work and arrangements coupled to Van Leer's classical influence (and his yodeling on their breakthrough hit, "Hocus Pocus"), the new group found a large international audience beginning in 1972, which transformed Akkerman into a superstar guitarist. His solo career actually dated from 1968, though his attempt at a solo album, later titled Guitar for Sale — containing his covers of numbers such as "What'd I Say," "Ode to Billy Joe," and "Green Onions" — was so primitive by the standards of the time that it was deemed unreleasable until Akkerman started topping reader surveys in the mid-'70s. Profile, released in 1972 after he'd begun making some headway with his reputation, also dated from 1969 and his days with Brainbox. Akkerman's first real solo album reflecting his music and interests at the time appeared in 1974, in the form of Tabernakel, which was recorded during the summer of that year at Atlantic Recording Studios in New York — having finally acquired a medieval lute of his own, he taught himself to play it and the results comprise more than half of this LP, made up of authentic medieval music and originals composed in a medieval mode. It was certainly the most unusual record ever to feature the playing of Tim Bogart (bass) and Carmine Appice (drums), as well as soul drummer Ray Lucas. After leaving Focus in 1976, Akkerman began releasing a stream of solo albums, which frequently embraced classical, jazz, and blues, and started leading his own bands. Much of his work during the 1980s wasn't released officially outside of Holland, but his periodic recordings with Van Leer, coupled with efforts to revive Focus with its two major stars, kept his name circulating in international music circles. The only problem that Akkerman faces derives from the sheer eclecticism of his work, which makes him very difficult to categorize — two different branches of Tower Records in the same city listed him as a jazz and a rock artist, respectively, but one could just as easily make a claim for him as a classical artist. © Bruce Eder, allmusic.com