''Offramp'' is the third album by the

Pat Metheny Group The Pat Metheny Group was an American jazz band founded in 1977. The core members of the group were guitarist, composer and bandleader Pat Metheny; and keyboardist and composer Lyle Mays, who was in the group at its inception. Other long-standi ...

, released in 1982. It won the

Grammy Award for Best Jazz Fusion Performance The Grammy Award for Best Jazz Fusion Performance was an award given to a song or album for excellence in the jazz fusion genre, a combination of rock and jazz. It was given at the Grammy Awards, which began in 1958 under the name Gramophone Awar ...

. It contains the popular ballad "

Are You Going with Me? "Are You Going with Me?" is a song by American contemporary jazz ensemble the Pat Metheny Group; it was composed by Metheny and keyboardist Lyle Mays. It was originally recorded in October 1981 for the band's third studio album ''Offramp''. Backgr ...

". ''Offramp'' is the first studio album on which Metheny used a

guitar synthesizer A guitar synthesizer is any one of a number of musical instrument systems that allow a guitarist to access synthesizer capabilities. Overview Today's guitar synths are direct descendants of 1970s devices from manufacturers (often in partner ...

, a

Roland GR-300 The Roland GR-300 is a guitar synthesizer manufactured by Roland Corporation. The GR-300 was considered the first "playable" guitar synthesizer. (Its predecessor, the GR-500, was plagued with tracking problems that rendered it virtually unplayable ...

controlled with a Roland G-303 guitar synthesiser controller. The guitar synthesizer became one of Metheny's most frequently used instruments. ''Offramp'' is also the first Group album to feature vocals, which became a fundamental component of the band's sound. When Metheny and

Lyle Mays Lyle David Mays (November 27, 1953 – February 10, 2020) was an American jazz pianist, composer, and member of the Pat Metheny Group. Metheny and Mays composed and arranged nearly all of the group's music, for which Mays won eleven Grammy Awa ...

partnered with Brazilian percussionist

Naná Vasconcelos Juvenal de Holanda Vasconcelos, known as Naná Vasconcelos (2 August 1944 – 9 March 2016), was a Brazilian percussionist, vocalist and berimbau player, notable for his work as a solo artist on over two dozen albums, and as a backing musician wi ...

on the album ''

As Falls Wichita, So Falls Wichita Falls ''As Falls Wichita, So Falls Wichita Falls'' is a collaborative album by Pat Metheny and Lyle Mays, released in 1981. The title makes reference to Wichita, Kansas, and Wichita Falls, Texas. The title track is just under 21 minutes. Throughout th ...

'', they sought to expand the potential of the recording studio as an ensemble instrument and experiment with sounds they hadn't previously utilized. Some of the innovations introduced on ''Wichita'' carried over into ''Offramp'', namely Vasconcelos's vocals and percussion stylings. Bassist

Mark Egan Mark Egan (born January 14, 1951 in Brockton, Massachusetts, United States) is an American jazz bassist and trumpeter known for his membership in the Pat Metheny Group and the Gil Evans Orchestra. He is co-founder of the jazz fusion band, Elem ...

was replaced by Steve Rodby, who remained with the Group well into the 2000s and became an important partner in the compositional and production processes between Metheny and Mays. The Group pays tribute to one of Metheny's biggest influences, pioneering

free jazz Free jazz is an experimental approach to jazz improvisation that developed in the late 1950s and early 1960s when musicians attempted to change or break down jazz conventions, such as regular tempos, tones, and chord changes. Musicians duri ...

instrumentalist

Ornette Coleman Randolph Denard Ornette Coleman (March 9, 1930 – June 11, 2015) was an American jazz saxophonist, violinist, trumpeter, and composer known as a principal founder of the free jazz genre, a term derived from his 1960 album '' Free Jazz: A Colle ...

, on the title track, and singer-songwriter

James Taylor James Vernon Taylor (born March 12, 1948) is an American singer-songwriter and guitarist. A six-time Grammy Award winner, he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2000. He is one of the best-selling music artists of all time, havi ...

served as the inspiration for the sixth track, "James."

Reception

''Offramp'' was critically acclaimed and commercially successful at the time of its release. It won the Playboy Readers Poll for Best Jazz Album and the 1982

, the Group's first of ten Grammys. The album continues to be acclaimed by critics and fans of the Group for its compositional maturity, technological progressiveness, especially for the time it was recorded, and for introducing key hallmarks of the Group's overall sound, namely the guitar synthesizer and vocals. It was voted number 669 in the third edition of

Colin Larkin Colin Larkin (born 1949) is a British writer and entrepreneur. He founded, and was the editor-in-chief of, the ''Encyclopedia of Popular Music'', described by ''The Times'' as "the standard against which all others must be judged". Along wit ...

's ''

All Time Top 1000 Albums ''All Time Top 1000 Albums'' is a book by Colin Larkin, creator and editor of the ''Encyclopedia of Popular Music''. The book was first published by Guinness Publishing in 1994. The list presented is the result of over 200,000 votes cast by th ...

'' (2000).

Track listing

Note *A composition entitled "The Bat" appeared on Metheny's collaborative jazz album '' 80/81'', in 1980. "The Bat Part II" is a reworking of that song.

Personnel

Pat Metheny Patrick Bruce Metheny ( ; born August 12, 1954) is an American jazz guitarist and composer. He is the leader of the Pat Metheny Group and is also involved in duets, solo works, and other side projects. His style incorporates elements of progre ...

– electric and acoustic guitar,

, Synclavier *

– piano, synthesizers, autoharp, electric organ, Synclavier * Steve Rodby – electric and acoustic bass *

Danny Gottlieb Daniel Richard Gottlieb (born April 18, 1953) is an American drummer. He was a founding member of the Pat Metheny Group and was co-founder of Elements with Mark Egan. Biography Gottlieb was born in New York City on April 18, 1953. He took less ...

– drums *

– percussion, voice,

berimbau The berimbau () is a single-string percussion instrument, a musical bow, originally from Africa, that is now commonly used in Brazil. The berimbau would eventually be incorporated into the practice of the Afro-Brazilian martial art ''capoeir ...

Charts

Album – '' Billboard''

Awards

Grammy Award The Grammy Awards (stylized as GRAMMY), or simply known as the Grammys, are awards presented by the Recording Academy of the United States to recognize "outstanding" achievements in the music industry. They are regarded by many as the most pres ...

References

{{Authority control Pat Metheny albums 1982 albums ECM Records albums Albums produced by Manfred Eicher Grammy Award for Best Jazz Fusion Performance