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Review by Michael G. Nastos, All Music Guide

This group, with no one named Jacob Fred, is one of the jammin-est outfits to come down the pike in a long while, the ultimate '90s bohemians. They fuse many heavy elements of modern electric and acoustic music, with no small tip of the cap to '70s bands like Soft Machine, the Muffins, Mallard, and even the more electric Don Cherry combos. The majority of this CD was captured live at Club One in Tulsa, OK, but there are two studio tracks. And there's this fearless quality, as if the band agrees to drink in everything musical and redefine it with even more reckless abandon. You'll hear treated and modified Fender Rhodes piano from Brian Haas, who can make it shimmer, quiver, or quake. Trombonist Matt Leland and trumpeter Kyle Wright take very aggressive solos, Leland has similar vocal characteristics to Ray Anderson's , and the rhythm section of drummer Sean Layton, percussionist Matthew Edwards, bassist Reed Mathis, and guitarist Dove McHargue push and pull with the funky flow, or accent the over the top dynamics of every measure. And the crowd during the concert segments goes wild right along with them. Compositionally they like odd mixed meters as the introductory 7/4-6/8 "Seven Inch Six," the 10/4 funk with rock guitar solo "MMW" (Medeski, Martin & Wood??) or the ostinato riffs that let the band implode improvisationally during "Mountain Scream" and "Seventh Greenbelt." Haas gets into time phase shifted sounds on "Welcome Home," Sputnik-like keyboards on "Road to Emmaus," and hard Rhodes funk for "Muskogee Smalls." There's one vocal, Layton's Leon Redbone cum Van Morrison slurs on the otherwise easy blues-to-static funk workout "Stomp." The Odyssey gets to the heart of what spirited, collective, toss-out-the-labels music making is all about. Kudos to Russ Gershon at Accurate for finding this band for (hopefully) all the world to hear. Highly recommended, especially if you enjoy the aforementioned pioneer bands of this "fusion" genre.