Fusion - Any Recommendations?

synthfreek - it's ok that people are just listing random jazz fusion bands - that's what i was looking for. i wouldn't expect anyone else to be like Area. they're pretty unique. the fact that they have high left-win socialist and/or communist lyrics means almost nothing to me anyway since they sing in Italian, but it sure SOUNDS cool...

If you dig the avant tendencies of Area, alot of the recommendations so far will seem pretty milktoast and pedestrian. If you want high quality mind altering rock influenced instrumental (or mostly instrumental music) that can gobble up alot of brain cells, there's moutains of it available. You may want to dig through some old Agon music threads for some artist lists... here's quick grab of 10 narcotic favorites to help scratch the surface, (not ranking any of em' ... lots of stuff not mentioned is also real spiff):
Tipographica (1st)
Fermata (1st two are usually on one disc)
Univers Zero (Hard Quest)
Ruins (Burning Stone or Hyderomastgroningem)
Massacre (Killing Time, other three are great too)
Lucas Niggli Zoom (Spawn Of Speed)
Sonny Sharrock (Seize The Rainbow)
ADD Trio (Sic Bisquitus Disintegrat)
Dr. Nerve (Skin)
Hamster Theatre (Mr. Personality/Quasi Day Room)

If you wanted to stay w/ Italy Check out:
Apoteosi
Arti + Mestieri (1st two)
Banco (early stuff)
Balletto di Bronzo (YS)
Bella Band
Deus ex Machina
DFA
Garybaldi (Astrolabio)
Il Volo (Essre Non Essre)
New Trolls (UT)
Nova (1st three)
Osanna
Perigeo (early stuff)
PFM (early stuff),
Zu (How To Raise An Ox).
Also check out Wayside Music (they have a great on line catalog). Same goes for Squidco (Phil Zampino) and Lasers Edge (Ken Golden).

Many good titles/artists already listed. Try these too:

Miles Davis
"Tribute to Jack Johnson"
several cuts off of "Live Evil"

Dixie Dregs
"Night of the Living Dregs"
"What if"
and others

Frank Zappa
some cuts off of
"Live at the Roxy and Elsewhere"
"One Size Fits All"
but especially
"Shut Up 'N' Play Yer Guitar" unfricking believable stuff

Jeff Beck
"Blow by Blow"
"Wired"

One last perhaps unexpected suggestion

Talking Heads - "Remain in Light"

All the above are guitar heavy fusion. If you like Mahavishnu Orchestra and Return to Forever, you should check these others out.

Put Billy Cobham's "Spectrum" on in your car when you are heading out on a road trip and see if it doesn't help you settle into a serious driving groove. Then play Beck's "Blow by Blow" or "Wired" and roar off into the sunset. HOOA!

I'm a big fan of Fusion. Whenever I see this question asked elsewhere, the results always mirror what I'm seeing here; the majority of the rec's are from 30+ years ago and/or groups like Fourplay are mentioned. Don't get me wrong, I dug Fourplay's 1st record and own a few of the Section's records (great band!) but I'd NEVER classify them as Fusion. Here's a short list of Fusion recordings that've been recorded within the last decade that are truly slammin'!

Karizma - Document
Jing-Chi - 3D
Cosmic farm
Flashpoint
Mathieson, LaBoriel, Landau, & Colauita - Live At The Baked Potato
Michael Landau - Live '06
Michael Landau - Tales From The Bulge
Scott Kinsey - Kinesthetics
Cab 4
Larry Carlton/Steve Lukather - Live In Osaka
Adam Holzman - JazzRocketScience
Uncle Moe's Space Ranch
Dave Weckl - Live
Garry Willis - Bent
Garry Willis - No Sweat
Derek Sherinian - Black Utopia
Simon Phillips - Out Of The Blue (Live)
Chambers, Berlin, Fiuczynski, & Lavitz - Boston T Party
Dennis Chambers - Outbreak
El Grupo - Live
Front Page
Howe, Wooten, & Chambers - Extraction
and lastly, an oldie from '91 that I consider a Fusion classic, good luck finding it!;)
Chroma - Music On The Edge

Most of these can be found over at Audiophile Imports. BTW, Caldera happens to be one of my favorite bands and for the record, Carlos Santana never played with them. The guitarist for this great band always was Jorge Strunz, playing rippin' electric before he went all-acoustic with Strunz & Farah. If you're diggin' true Fusion and DON'T own records by the Mahavishnu Orchestra, Return To Forever, or Weather Report, by all means, scoop these bad boys up but I'm here to tell ya that true Fusion is more than alive and well in the 21st Century!!;)

here's some more gems that haven't been mentioned (I don't think):

- "Electromagnets" self titles release - the group includes Eric Johnson on guitar
- Niacin - "Time Crunch" amazing Hammond B3 fusion.
- Kraan - "Live" this is a German group
- Jean Luc Ponty - "Aurora" and "Enigmatic Ocean"