Lost Tribe

Rather than coalescing as a conventional band, Lost Tribe originated as an assembly of first-call session players pursuing outside projects. Comparable to the 1970s British ensemble Brand X, which served as Phil Collins’s jazz-fusion outlet apart from Genesis, the collective absorbed the decade’s prevailing currents, fusing rhythmic jazz and rock with occasional hip-hop inflections. On the self-titled 1993 debut, saxophonist David Binney’s lean phrasing and the dual-guitar thrust supplied by Adam Rogers and David Gilmore floated above the locked-in foundation of bassist Fima Ephron and drummer Ben Perowsky. Although the material remained largely instrumental, a lone rap cut (“Letter to the Editor”) and a chanted vocal piece (“Mofungo”) interrupted the stream of high-velocity fusion numbers such as “Mythology” and “Cause & Effect.” The 1994 successor, Soulfish, sharpened its attack while retaining rhythmic clarity; Perowsky’s powerful drumming on “Whodunit” and the guitar exchanges on “Second Story,” “Planet Rock,” and “Fuzzy Logic” produced a fresh alloy of funk and metal. Because the group’s chemistry drew equally from Ephron’s work with the rap-jazz-opera hybrid Screaming Headless Torsos, Perowsky’s association with jazz-fusion guitarist Mike Stern, and Gilmore’s tenure alongside African-influenced saxophonist Steve Coleman, the inherent transience of session life inevitably slowed activity. Binney issued solo recordings while Rogers concentrated on freelance dates; Ephron, Perowsky, and Gilmore—frequently mistaken for Pink Floyd guitarist David Gilmour—spent the ensuing four years touring and tracking with other ensembles. When Lost Tribe returned with Many Lifetimes in 1998, Gilmore had already departed to balance teaching with performance. Track titles such as “The River,” “Kyoto,” and “Jordan” pointed toward a more melodic and restrained direction, yet Ephron and Perowsky still supplied moments of intensity. On that album Perowsky augmented his usual kit with percussion and Fender Rhodes electric piano, demonstrating the same drive he brings to Stern’s road band despite the guitarist’s history of recording with virtuosos such as Dennis Chambers and Vinnie Colaiuta. The bassist, widely admired yet little known outside certain circles, now anchors both the vocal and instrumental editions of guitarist David Fiuczynski’s Screaming Headless Torsos, leaving the prospects for future Lost Tribe sessions—in studio or onstage—uncertain.