"No Notice" is a hard-swinging shuffle blues from Mike Stern's 1988 album Time in Place, showcasing Stern's deep blues roots alongside tenor saxophonist Bob Berg. Stern tears through five choruses of a 12-bar blues in B-flat, his overdriven guitar tone and aggressive phrasing recalling his acknowledged debt to blues-rock guitarists while maintaining jazz harmonic awareness. Berg follows with four equally fiery choruses, his robust tenor sound and bebop-rooted vocabulary bringing a different but complementary energy to the blues form. The shuffle groove provides a earthy, swinging foundation that differs from the rock and fusion feels heard elsewhere on the album, grounding both soloists in the blues tradition that underlies all jazz improvisation. Drummer Peter Erskine and bassist Jeff Andrews lock into a deep pocket that propels the soloists forward. No Notice demonstrates that for all his fusion credentials, Stern remained fundamentally a blues-based player whose most exciting improvisations drew their power from the directness and emotional honesty of the 12-bar form.
