I just listened to this album, and really enjoyed it. What does

album pictured is definitely jazz prog (has structures of jazz but sound of prog, if I recall correctly), Birds of Fire is proto-prog metal; people say this is a jazz fusion album because of John McLaughlin and his involvement with Miles Davis that ended around this time

I like The Inner Mounting Flame but Birds of Fire is just a little stronger than that. Haven't heard any other Mahavishnu yet.

>>74596780
it's a hazy dilineation

fusion is pretty much instrumental prog with more improvisation

>>74596780

I'm a prog-head, and this was the first album in this sub-genre I ever heard.

Was very disappointed the first time I listened to it, only really liking "You Know, You Know" and "A Lotus on Irish Streams".

Every time I listened, I realized that I actually liked more and more parts and was eager to get the rest from this iteration of the group (Birds of Fire, Lost Trident Sessions, Between Nothingness...). IMO, John stills plucks too hard on "Lotus", though.

>>74596780
Great album. It's a stylistic link between McLaughlin's playing pre and post-Lifetime playing. I don't know what this "prog" shit is, but that album is undoubtedly jazz-fusion.

Mahavishnu always seems to teeter on the line between Jazz-Fusion and Prog-Rock.

Fusion varies a lot, some is more on the rock side and some is more on the jazz side (and some more on the avant-garde side). Like Jazz itself it doesn't all sound the same.

Sadly Rick Laird is kind of lacking as a fusion bassist, I shit you not, his solo on One Word (Birds of Fire) is straight off of The Gumbo Variations (Hot Rats). His string bass playing with the Victor Feldman Trio is great but, really disappointing with Mahavishnu, IMO