DESCRIPTION:
"No Reservations" was titled for the fact that we (Dutch engineer Paul Jeukendrup & I) had none en route to Basel to record a few tunes with Rene Engel (Dutch master-drummer) and a Danish bass player (Hans van Binsbergen). I had written the tune while in Aarhus (Denmark) with the Hans and a drummer friend of his, which was a lot of fun and turned out well, aside from the wierd way we mic'd the drums (with a centre-panned mic and another in/out of phase L&R; there's name for the technique, which didn't work for us, and I don't know why we tried that).
Paul Mason also took to this tune -- and insisted that we record it (and I thank him as, even though I didn't write the tune with him & Marc, it probably captures most closely the process of putting the tune together): I don't feel it's more than a riff and a B-section -- and so it doesn't stand up, to me, as more than simply something to enjoy playing.
Maybe that's the fault of 'fusion' in general, with hugely notably exceptions in the genre (for me these exceptions include Allan Holdsworth, Vince Mendoza, and especially Andrea Marcelli, the Italian drummer/clarinetist/composer whose "Silent Will" and "Oneness" remain my all-time favourite fusion records for the strength of their compositions, let alone stellar cast & playing). Listening to it again may years later, I do like the way that the drum solo over the riff segues into the outro -- and how that goes through different transpositions and builds in dynamics (or at least was supposed to, although my playing is dynamically flat compared to what Paul & Marc do). The solo was a pretty honest representation of my ability to improvise -- and all its influences and (not exclusively because of them) limitations.