Trip Mode

Three-time Grammy nominee, master of the jazz organ, trumpeter and vocalist Joey DeFrancesco swings hard and straight ahead. A prodigious talent at an early age, he joined the Miles Davis band when he was seventeen. At eighteen, he began touring with his own quartet. At twenty-two, John Mclaughlin called him along with drummer Dennis Chambers to form the group “Free Spirits.” Subsequently, Joey worked with greats such as George Benson, James Moody and Ray Charles. He’s won the Downbeat Critics Poll ten times and the Readers Poll every year since 2005. His current trio with Dan Wilson guitar and Jason Brown drums promises to rock the house.

Once upon a time, on January 11th 2019 (pre-plague), a rag-tag group of Scottish musical ne’er-do-wells flew to a fancy-ass studio in Sweden on an impossible mission to record, in two whole days, an album of the only eleven songs they could actually play. Were it not for a series of mishaps, bad calls, vodka, general tomfoolery (those f****** gloves!) and one near-death experience, they might just about have managed it too.

The Trip were but one of many Italian bands combining rock, classical, jazz, pop and folk to produce what is now known as the Italian rock renaissance. They are another three man classical rock band in the realm of the Nice and Le Orme. All four of their albums are completely different and bear the stamp of another international group or movement. "Caronte" was considered their best album by psych collectors. On their third, "Atlantide", The Trip looks squarely at Emerson, Lake & Palmer for inspiration. The both are recommended to ELP or Le Orme fans.