Synergy 2 (musician synergy)

edited August 2016 in Musicians
Was listening to late 70s Fleetwood Mac today.
Really enjoyed it.
But also it reminded me of an interview I saw with Lindsey Buckingham in which he said that he is more proud of his creative work on the songs of others in the band (i.e. his harmonies, ideas for arrangements, solos, etc.,.. on the songs of Christine McVie and Stevie Nicks) than he is of his own compositions in Fleetwood Mac.
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And in my mind, this tied in with farout's recent thread on synergy within hifi systems.

My initial headline thought was that great bands are almost defined by the fact that the excellence they produce is a consequence of the remarkable synergy of their various creative tallents. I think Lindsey Buckingham and Christine McVie are a good example of this, but possibly even better examples are Lenon - McCartney (and arguably George Martin) in The Beatles, or Squire - Brown (and arguably John Leckie) in The Stone Roses to name but 2.
I own solo albums by Buckingham, McCartney, Lenon and Ian Brown. All have very good moments from which I draw considerable enjoyment, but none come close to the qualities that they achieved with their most effective team mates. It's sum of the parts stuff again...
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And I then I thought that creative synergy is really what the purpose of any band is, musically and creatively. Quite profound and joyful and affirming and humbing to be part of actually, even if one is not working with The Beatles in Abbey Road studios.
And then I worried I was stating the obvious.
But, I'm wondering what examples there are of musicians who have produced music with specific other musicians that has been obviously signifincantly better than their work with any other musicians...?
Examples of musician synergy please (Davis - Coltrane...?)!
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Comments

  • Another great example would be the band Genesis. The albums Trespass through to The Lamb... were all made by the same line up, with input from all, who were all very talented musicians. As members started peeling off the depth, complexity and wizardry of the compositions faded. Although all have had successful solo careers, producing some lovely music, none have reached the same heights of brilliance in composition as solo acts. Many other bands are the same, even  rock acts like Deep Purple, Led Zeppelin etc. etc. I'm sure the list is endless of musiscians just waiting to meet the right musical soul-mates to truly shine.
  • Yeah.
    ...If I'd got my turn with John Lennon, I'd have revolutionised popular music!
  • John Coltrane and Elvin Jones.

    Paul Motian with Charlie Haden or Gary Peacock.

    Jaco Pastorius and Peter Erskine.

    Wiliam Parker and Hamid Drake.

    Donald Fagan and Walter Becker.

    I could go on...



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