The anagrammatic title, credited to one Gerry Mulligan, signals an album originally seen as a follow-up to the Ampex album (last reissued on Enja as Blues In Orbit, see Jazzwise 139) – an intervening recording, Where Flamingos Fly, was only issued much later on Artists House. Svengali even opens with two previous standouts from Blues In Orbit, namely George Russell's title-track and Billy Harper's ‘Thoroughbred’, featuring a heavy jazz-rock beat. These new, longer versions are quite similar, with a few synth touches added to some backing figures, and guitarist Dunbar soloing before Harper on ‘Thoroughbred’. Dunbar is also the only soloist on a short soft-rock ‘Summertime’, derived from the Miles arrangement, and another even briefer disappointment is the track ‘Eleven’, which is the head from Miles's ‘Petits Machins’, re-titled for its time-signature. The plus-points are the wild ensembles of ‘Cry Of Hunger’ (another tune by Harper, who plays a blinder) and ‘Zee Zee’, a slow repeated phrase in 5/4 over which Hannibal builds an impressive solo, foreshadowing his contribution to Evans's 1978 ‘Variations On The Misery’.