Jan Hammer Group - Melodies (Reissue) (1977)

By the time of Melodies, keyboardist Jan Hammer had largely shed his more experimental tendencies and settled into a comfortable, R&B-based fusion groove. The tracks on Melodies tend to be between two-and-a-half and four-and-a-half minutes -- just about the length of most pop songs -- and so some hardcore jazz listeners might be dismayed at the relative lack of boundary-stretching, even though that isn't really the point of this music. Melodies doesn't quite catch fire as often as some of its predecessors -- Like Children and Oh, Yeah?, for example -- but its best moments are catchy, accessible, and funky.