Donald Byrd Places and Spaces (Blue Note) 1976
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Byrd’s fifth straight collaboration with the Mizell Brothers yielded an album full of smooth but tricky dance-floor grooves and staggering yet unobtrusive musical dynamism. Chuck Rainey’s deft Fender-bass work provides “Dominoes” with an eminently sample-ready musical foundation but also colors Byrd’s music with a barely perceptible, and often overlooked, tinge of unease.
