The L.A. Express was an American

jazz fusion Jazz fusion (also known as fusion and progressive jazz) is a music genre that developed in the late 1960s when musicians combined jazz harmony and jazz improvisation, improvisation with rock music, funk, and rhythm and blues. Electric guitars, ...

ensemble. Members of L.A. Express played on several

Joni Mitchell Roberta Joan "Joni" Mitchell ( Anderson; born November 7, 1943) is a Canadian-American musician, producer, and painter. Among the most influential singer-songwriters to emerge from the 1960s folk music circuit, Mitchell became known for her sta ...

albums, namely '' Court and Spark'', '' The Hissing of Summer Lawns'' and the live album '' Miles of Aisles'' between 1974 and 1975. The band also had two jazz instrumental albums on their own - ''L.A. Express'' (1976), and ''Shadow Play'' (1976). The latter featured backing vocals and cover art by Mitchell. Both albums were recorded at James Guercio's Caribou Ranch

studio A studio is an artist or worker's workroom. This can be for the purpose of acting, architecture, painting, pottery (ceramics), sculpture, origami, woodworking, scrapbooking, photography, graphic design, filmmaking, animation, industrial design ...

and were the first albums released on the

Caribou Reindeer (in North American English, known as caribou if wild and ''reindeer'' if domesticated) are deer in the genus ''Rangifer''. For the last few decades, reindeer were assigned to one species, ''Rangifer tarandus'', with about 10 subspe ...

label.

Career

The L.A. Express formed in 1973 as the backing band for jazz saxophonist Tom Scott. The original lineup included bassist Max Bennett, drummer John Guerin, guitarist

Larry Carlton Larry Eugene Carlton (born March 2, 1948) is an American guitarist who built his career as a studio musician in the 1970s and 1980s for acts such as Steely Dan and Joni Mitchell. He has participated in thousands of recording sessions, recorde ...

, and keyboardist Joe Sample (the latter two were also members of the group The Crusaders). They recorded the album ''Tom Scott and the L.A. Express'', as well as a number of tracks on Joni Mitchell's '' Court and Spark'' album in 1974 with this lineup, before both Carlton and Sample left the group. Robben Ford replaced Carlton as guitarist and

Larry Nash Larry is a masculine given name in English, derived from Lawrence (given name), Lawrence or Laurence. It can be a shortened form of those names. Larry may refer to the following: People Arts and entertainment *Larry D. Alexander, American arti ...

took over as the group's keyboardist. The group also performed the score to the 1974 adult animated comedy film '' The Nine Lives of Fritz the Cat''. With Ford and Nash on board, Tom Scott and the L.A. Express recorded the ''Tom Cat'' album in late 1974 (released on Ode Records in early 1975). In '' Christgau's Record Guide: Rock Albums of the Seventies'' (1981),

Robert Christgau Robert Thomas Christgau ( ; born April 18, 1942) is an American music journalist and essayist. Among the most well-known and influential music critics, he began his career in the late 1960s as one of the earliest professional rock critics and ...

dismissed it as " background music without the foreground. It doesn't

swing Swing or swinging may refer to: Apparatus * Swing (seat), a hanging seat that swings back and forth * Pendulum, an object that swings * Russian swing, a swing-like circus apparatus * Sex swing, a type of harness for sexual intercourse * Swing rid ...

, it doesn't rock—it hops." After the release of ''Tom Cat'', Scott left the group and began recording solo. The group recorded their first album without Scott in 1976 - the self-titled ''L.A. Express'', which had as cover art a close-up of a belt buckle embossed with the band's name (simply "L.A. Express"), similar to one reading "Tom Scott & the L.A. Express" which was worn by a model on the cover of their first album with Scott. Later in the same year they recorded ''Shadow Play'', which included several popular jazz tracks played on jazz radio well into the early 1980s. On the first of these two albums keyboardist Larry Nash was replaced by Victor Feldman, and David Luell played saxophone and woodwinds. Robben Ford left the group prior to the recording of ''Shadow Play'' and was replaced by guitarist Peter Maunu.

References

{{Authority control American jazz ensembles from California Musical groups established in 1973 1973 establishments in California 1970s disestablishments in California Joni Mitchell Musical backing groups