Jade Warrior
Released

[...] Characters whose existence the younger generations do not know, not even by hearsay, and acronyms that even at the time were not able to move the sales charts. Next to bands and musicians of considerable popularity, and often great earnings (not always justified by the quality of the proposed music), it is right and proper to place, with equal dignity and honor, names familiar only to hardened enthusiasts, who deserve a fairer placement in the historical treatment of rock music for their sometimes (surprising) musical merits. [...]*

A "necessary" introduction for a splendid work relegated "unjustly" to the margins of a musical phenomenon of vast proportions and reach as progressive.

The "revival" of said album is thus equally "necessary".

It concerns Released, year 1972.

[...] Following the dissolution of July, Tony Duhig and Jon Field form Jade Warrior and their old companion Patrick Campbell-Lyons, having become a producer at Vertigo, offers the group the chance to record three albums for the label of the spiral. The second Released (1972) (the others are Jade Warrior - 1971 - and Last autumn's dream - 1972, and still various later works for Island) can be held as an example of the singular musical proposition,[...]*

The Jade Warrior, an excellent ensemble belonging to the "thick" progressive underground from across the Channel, are advocates of a dazzling sound mix "pregnant" with Mediterranean, African, and "violently" tribal sounds.

Warm sounds, boiling percussions, creativity, and originality immersed in intoxicating folk-jazz atmospheres characterized by a rather spicy taste, pronounced exotic components, and veiled psychedelic raids.

Paradigm of the varied and multifaceted sound mixture of Jade Warrior, Three Horned Dragon King, enchants with its compositional freshness and the richness of contaminations present; remarkable the wind arrangements surrounded by the warm and hypnotic sound of bongos, congas, and  percussions  as well as piercing guitar outbursts with distinctly hard features not only of the mentioned track but of the entire work. (Eyes On You, Minnamoto's Dream )

Released, a truly polyhedral work, also reveals a surprising (and latent) psychedelic vein; Water Curtain Cave "impregnated" with impalpable acid-lysergic moods and markedly "cosmic" sounds, is a candid example of it.

"Epitome" of the album and totally instrumental, Barazinbar, with its fifteen minutes offers the listener kaleidoscopic sounds characterized by granite riffs of electric guitar slipping over enveloping "jazzy" carpets (sax & flute) and captivating percussions; the fleeting, liquid, and delicate introductory atmosphere, marked by bucolic percussions, breaks against a powerful sound orgy in which hard, free jazz, and folk splendidly blend.

Sound chaos, instrumental vortex, Released also boasts idyllic acoustic ballads (Yellow Eyes, Bride Of Summer) with soft, delicate tones imbued with melancholy; the progression is listless, relaxed, an ephemeral "escapade" from the frenetic rhythms peculiar to the entire album.

A work to "discover" or simply to "re-listen to".

[...] But (as thin as it may be) a thread remains to follow, their music that still lives, which can be heard thanks to the perversion of a music business that cyclically adapts to rediscover any past event, which deserves to be listened to and loved at least as much as that of the brethren favored by good fortune. Pretending not to notice, avoiding giving these people the due recognition would be an unforgivable mistake. To not forget. [...]*

*: All quotes from GianCarlo Nanni (Il Rock Progressivo Inglese)