The Best of Mickey Hart: Over the Edge and Back

Amazon.com
The snarling grooves of doom on "Angola" symbolize Grateful Dead drummer Mickey Hart's intent for the last quarter century: to create a global percussion orchestra that merges electronics with rhythms from around the world. Hart could have opted for a seamless conceptual album, moving from the impressionism of "Temple Caves" from Planet Drum and "Compound" from the Apocalypse Now sessions to the power-trance grooves of "Angola" (Supralingua) and "Udu Chant" (also from Planet Drum). Instead, Over the Edge and Back is a sampler that even includes tracks from Hart's vocal album, Mystery Box, which ranged disjointedly from the R&B of "Where Love Goes (Sito)" to the Robert Hunter-penned "Down the Road"--both heard here and sounding lost. Skip those, however, and you'll hear Mickey Hart's rhythmic fantasies. The album goes all the way back to his 1976 album with the Diga Rhythm Band for "Sweet Sixteen," an ecstatic whirl of tuned percussion and hand drums that still sounds vibrant today. The album concludes with the previously unreleased "Call to All Nations" from the opening ceremonies of the 100th Olympiad in Atlanta in 1996. A surreal compression of global music that traverses the world, the track is Mickey Hart's vision of a 21st-century percussion orchestra summed up in about five minutes. --John Diliberto

Tracks:

Angola
Where Love Goes
Down The Road
Sweet Sixteen
The Eliminators
Udu Chant
Temple Caves
Compound
Call To All Nations: Opening Ceremonies, 100th Olympiad, Atlanta 1996

Amazon.com

The snarling grooves of doom on "Angola" symbolize Grateful Dead drummer Mickey Hart's intent for the last quarter century: to create a global percussion orchestra that merges electronics with rhythms from around the world. Hart could have opted for a seamless conceptual album, moving from the impressionism of "Temple Caves" from Planet Drum and "Compound" from the Apocalypse Now sessions to the power-trance grooves of "Angola" (Supralingua) and "Udu Chant" (also from Planet Drum). Instead, Over the Edge and Back is a sampler that even includes tracks from Hart's vocal album, Mystery Box, which ranged disjointedly from the R&B of "Where Love Goes (Sito)" to the Robert Hunter-penned "Down the Road"--both heard here and sounding lost. Skip those, however, and you'll hear Mickey Hart's rhythmic fantasies. The album goes all the way back to his 1976 album with the Diga Rhythm Band for "Sweet Sixteen," an ecstatic whirl of tuned percussion and hand drums that still sounds vibrant today. The album concludes with the previously unreleased "Call to All Nations" from the opening ceremonies of the 100th Olympiad in Atlanta in 1996. A surreal compression of global music that traverses the world, the track is Mickey Hart's vision of a 21st-century percussion orchestra summed up in about five minutes. --John Diliberto

Customer Reviews:

Mostly good, but spoiled by..........2007-01-24

I bought this album in order to flesh out my already significant awe for Mickey and the succession of material he has produced. It's all the familiar great stuff, but utterly marred by the inclusion of the two tracks from "Mystery Box". In short Mickey, they should have remained a mystery. They are Vocal, R&B cheesy, saccharine and entirely out of place. If you like to listen to Hart for the shamanic beats and interestingly coloured exotic atmospheres, prepare to program your CD player to skip tracks 2 & 3 as they are just awful and guaranteed to ruin any moment. A poor choice from the producers; no doubt why I was able to buy it on ebay for £1.50.

I think there is nothing to be gained for the Hart fan here. One would be better off buying the original albums. Buy "Mystery Box" only if you feel in need of aural punishment.

Most of The Best Of Mickey Hart.......2002-08-14

Mickey Hart's "Best of" CD has a nice cross-section of pieces the percussionist has made.

All of the CD is good, but too short. I would have liked to have heard a bit from Hart's first solo effort, Rolling Thunder, but maybe that would have got in the way of contractual agreements between GDM and Ryko Disc.

The songs range from Hart's Diga band piece "Sweet Sixteen" to the Apacolype Now Sessions' "Compound", to Hart's first 90's foray into the world of percussion "On The Edge" with "The Eliminatiors", to Hart's award winning follow-up Planet Drum with tracks "Undo Chant" and "Temple Caves", to a tribute to the combination of music and voice found on Mystery Box tracks, "Where Love Goes (Sito)" and "Down The Road", to the opening track on Supralingua "Angola".

Unfortunately no tracks from "Spirit Into Sound" are to be found on this compilation (again maybe due to the fact that GDM was involved with the distribution of that project).

The real treat of this set comes at the end with Hart and Co. doing a superb Opening Ceramonies piece form the 1996 Olypiad -- called "A Call To All Nations" which is fabulous.

So, in this compilation you have some positives and negatives. If you want to enter and have a taste of Mickey's world, by all means purchase this. Be forwarned though, you might want to pick up the original albums from where these songs originated.

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