Tag: jazz fusion

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Individually Norwegian-born and-based trumpeter Nils Petter Molvær and French-born, Brooklyn-based percussionist Mino Cinelu have had accomplished careers: Cinelu first gained attention playing on Miles Davis‘ We Want Miles and Amandla, which has landed him gigs playing with Weather Report, Gong, Herbie Hancock, Pat Metheny, Sting, Santana, Lou Reed, Laurie Anderson and a eclectic and lengthy list of internationally acclaimed artists. The French percussionist has also released three solo albums and has collaborated with Dave Holland and Kevin Eubanks on World Trio. With 1997’s Khmer released through ECM Records, Nils Petter Molvær quickly established his unique sound and aesthetic — one which combines the Nordic feeling of nature with Southeast Asian sound philosophies. But since then, Molvær’s work has found him pushing his sound deeper into uncharted areas, while exploring various combinations of acoustic and electronic sounds. His work has allowed him to collaborate with German electronic producer Moritz von Oswald in 2013 with reggae artists Sly and Robbie in 2018 and with Bill Laswell on several occasions.

Slated for a September 4, 2020 release through BMG’s Modern Recordings, Cinelu and Molvær’s collaboration together SulaMadiana can trace its origins back to 2015 when the duo first met at a solo Molvær played in Turkey. Quickly agreeing to embark on a joint project together, it took several more meetings in different parts of the world and a handful of years before they were able to get together for a studio session in Oslo. Early this year, the recordings were rounded off in Cinelu’s Brooklyn studio with post-production completed as a remote, Transatlantic endeavor as a result of pandemic-related lockdowns. Speaking about the process, Cinelu says “The best way to start something is to start it. So I said: ‘let’s get started’. Nils brought a groove along which I liked, we enriched it with sounds and other grooves, wanted to find a melody, and it just made ‘Bang’. It was a real trip. A lot of blood, sweat and tears, but even more love.”

Sonically speaking both artists’ work represents two completely different worlds — Molvær’s work evokes the boreal cold of his homeland while Cinelu’s work evokes the rhythms and heat of Latin America and Africa. The album, which derives its name as a tribute to both artists’ heritage — Sula is the Norwegian island where Molvær grew up and Madiana is a loving nickname for the island of Martinique, where Cinleu’s father was born. The album’s material finds the duo finding a common sonic playground initially inspired by their previous work — but while pushing each other and their sound together into completely new territories: the album’s material finds Cinelu taking up vocal duties while Molvær plays acoustic, electric guitar and various other electronics. Of course for this to work, the interplay between the musicians is key. “We are different, but what we have in common is that we like to give some space to things,” Molvær says. Cinelu adds: “It doesn’t matter who has what share in music. We both know each other’s cultures, we find bridges and crossings, and often we walk these paths that lead in the same direction. We wrote everything together and followed our feelings. There are no limits or barriers.”

The album’s first single, album title track “SulaMadiana (For Manu Dibango)” is an ethereal yet funky tribute to Cinelu’s mentor Manu Dibango, centered around a propulsive acoustic guitar line, pedal effected trumpet, shimmering electric guitar soloing, atmospheric electronics, Afro-Latin percussion and Cinelu’s dreamy vocals. The end result is an adventurous and loving Vulcan mind-meld in which a wintry breeze blows through the propulsive funk in a way that evokes late summer.

 

 

 

 

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Crowd Company is a rising, London-based acid jazz/jazz fusion/funk octet featuring core members Rob Fleming (vocals, guitar), Emil Engstrom (bass), Claudio Corona (keys), Esther Dee (vocals), Jo Marshall (vocals) and Robin Lowrey (drums) with a horn section including a rotating cast of top local players like Piers Green and Ed Benstea that specializes in sound that draws from and features elements of 1960s soul, 70s jazz fusion, contemporary funk, the blues and jam band rock: their material is centered around arrangements that feature Hammond organ, a virtuous horn section, soulful vocals and three part harmonies and funky grooves paired with razor sharp hooks.

The British octet has also built up a reputation for a powerhouse live show, while opening for an impressive list of acclaimed and legendary artists including The Meters‘ George Porter, Jr., JOVM mainstays Soulive, The New Mastersounds, Saun & Starr, James Taylor Quartet and Monophonics among others.

Earlier this year, the band released their most recent album, the Alan Evans-produced and mixed Lowdown, which The Big Takeover lauded as an album “that bursts at the sonic seams with rich, vibrant and varied compositions.”  The rising British act’s latest single “Orbital” was recorded during the Lowdown sessions at Evans’ Iron Wax Studios. And although the track sees the members of Crowd Company continuing their collaboration with Lettuce’s Ryan Zoidis and Eric “Benny” Bloom, it wasn’t included as one of Lowdown‘s album tracks. Clocking in at a little under 5:30, the funky and intergalactic composition sees the act bridging acid jazz, jazz fusion, retro-futuristic funk and psychedelia in a way that reminds me of Switzerland’s merchants of jazzy grooves L’Eclair— but with an enormous Parliament Funkadelic-like horn section.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Swiss Instrumental Act L’Eclair Release a Hallucinogenic Visual for Shimmering and Funky New Single “Carousel”

Through the course of their first three albums, 2017’s Cruise Control, 2018’s Polymood and last year’s Sauropoda, the Geneva, Switzerland-based instrumental act L’Eclair have perfected and established a difficult to pigeonhole sound, centered around their unique groove-driven vision of instrumental music, which fearlessly blends genres and styles. It shouldn’t be surprising that at one point, the Swiss instrumental act managed to describe their sound in a number of different ways on their Facebook page, including referring to their sound as being “as if Booker T and the MGs came from Eastern Europe,” an obscure 70s movie soundtrack and as “kraut-exo-soul, brutal funk and Turkish groove.” Interestingly, the act closed out last year with a collaborative 7 inch with The Mauskovic Dance Band.

Building upon a growing profile, the Swiss sextet has toured to support those albums across Europe, bringing the funky grooves to audiences in Germany, France, The Netherlands, Belgium, Italy, Spain, Denmark, Luxembourg and the UK, including thee European Festival circuit, playing sets at Montreux Jazz Festival, Bad Bonn Kilbi, Les Transmusicales, Eurosonic Nooderslag, Copenhagen Jazz Festival and others. 

Continuing the momentum of the past couple of years, the Swiss sextet’s latest effort, Noshtta EP is slated for a May 22, 2020 leas through Bongo Joe Records, and the EP reportedly continues a run of material that’s specifically crafted to make you dance and cry at the same time. “Carousel,” Noshtta EP’s latest single is centered around an expansive and free- flowing arrangement of shifting tempos, shimmering and reverb drenched guitars, propulsive four-on-the floor, twinkling keys and a sinuous and funky bass lines. The track finds the act seamlessly meshing funk, jazz fusion, disco and kraurtock with a mischievously anachronistic retro-futurism — and it may arguably be the most dance floor friendly track they’ve released to date. The recently released video is a trippy mix of old-school CGI graphics, videotape hiss, and geometric shapes undulating in syncopation to the song.

Video by William Ruben Helms

Live Footage: Dani Lòpez Quartet Performs “Cafetera Stuff” at Olot Spain’s Sala El Torin

Dani Lòpez is a rising, Olot, Spain-born and-based composer, arranger, multi-instrumentalist, bandleader and producer, who picked up music at a very young age. Learning several different instruments, Lòpez quickly began writing original music for bands across an eclectic variety of genres and styles, including folk, jazz, classical and contemporary chamber music. Lòpez attended the Liceu Conservatory, where he studied classical saxophone under Albert Julià and David Sallers, graduating in 2016 — and composition under renowned composers Benet Casablancas and Benjamin Davies, graduating in 2018, Towards the end of his studies, the rising Spanish multi-instrumentalist earned the Ferrer-Salat Scholarship and a special prize for the composition degree. 

Over the past couple of years, Lòpez has written several chamber music pieces, including two scores for ensemble-based adaptations of Prudenci Betrana’s “Una agonia” and “En Busqueta” centered around flute, clarinet, violin, cello, piano and soprano vocal. He’s also written “Mirall Trencat,” a piece for saxophone quartet that has been performed in venues across Catalonia and Zurich, as well as a small concert for saxophone that has been performed in Spain, Portugal and Mexico. As a saxophonist, the Spanish multi-instrumentalist has won several contests for solo composition and chamber music, including 2013’s Arjau Catalanmusic and 2014’s Ecoparque de Trasmiera. 

Currently, Lòpez works as a freelance musician, who has played with several different projects including Magalí Sare, El Pot Petit, Holoquè, and Hop al Metro among others. 2020 has been a rather busy year for the rising Spanish artist: he recently produced, co-produce, crafted arrangements and/or cowrote material for three applauded albums: El Pot Petit’s 10 Anys, which won the 2020 Premis Enderrock Award for the Best Recording of Music for Families; Criatures’ Praxinoscopi, which won the 2020 Premis Enderrock Award for Best Folk Recording; and Aires del Montseny’s Lilure Albir. 

Adding to a busy year, the Spanish multi-instrumentalist’s forthcoming album El que fan les cases quan no les mires is slated for release this year through Segell Microscopi. Featuring a backing band of Andreu Moreno (drums, SPD), Vic Moliner (double bass, bass synthesizer), Alejandro Esperanza (piano, Rhodes, synths) and of course, Lopez (sax, flute, piano, synths, vocals), the album was recorded during a three day recording session at Ground Recording Studios in Cornelià de Terri.  The album’s compositions finds the Lòpez-led quartet crafting a sound that meshes elements and blurry the lines  of jazz, contemporary chamber music, folk and pop with a forward-thinking experimentalism, inspired by the Spanish multi-instrumentalist and composer’s fascinating with observing reality from up close. Instead of immediately taking the material to be mixed, there was a month of patient and painstaking post-production of the album’s material with Lòpez hand-picking the best tracks to be included on the album, as well as the album’s overarching theme. 

 El que fan les cases quan no les mires’ latest single “Cafetera Stuff” can trace its origins to a previous composition Lòpez had written for a chamber orchestra “Star Stuff.” As the story goes, in an inspired bout, he had started experimenting by playing the composition in a different chord. Centered around an expansive arrangement of shimmering piano arpeggios, atmospheric synths, rapid-fire rhythms, a propulsive bass line and samples of a coffee machine, the song shifts between tempos and modes with a mischievous and whimsical air. 

The recently released live footage features the quartet performing the song at Olot’s Sala El Torin — and it’s shot in a gorgeous black and white, while capturing the quartet’s energy and connection as a live unit. 

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

 

Throughout the course of this site’s eight-plus year history, I’ve written quite a bit about the Los Angeles-based singer/songwriter, bassist and JOVM mainstay Stephen “Thundercat” Bruner, and as you may recall Thundercat has developed a reputation as a highly-desired collaborator and a critically applauded solo artist; in fact, he has collaborated with Kendrick Lamar  on Lamar’s Grammy Award-winning album, To Pimp A Butterfly and  Brainfeeder Records labelmate, Kamasi Washington’s The Epic, which he promptly followed up with one of my favorite releases of 2015, the mini-album The Beyond/Where the Giants Roam. 2017’s Drunk, Bruner’s critically applauded third full-length album was written as an epic journey into the bizarre, hilarious and sometimes dark mind of the singer/songwriter and bassist, and it featured an All-Star list of collaborators including some of his go-to collaborators Kamasi Washington, Kendrick Lamar, Wiz Khalifa and Pharrell Williams, along with Michael McDonald and Kenny Loggins.

Currently comprised of founding members Matthew Tavares (keys), Chester Hansen (bass), and Alexander Sowinski (drums) with newest member Leland Whitty (saxophone), the Toronto, Ontario, Canada instrumental act BADBADNOTGOOD derive their name from an abandoned comedy TV project that Tavares was working on before the band formed – and whether as trio or a quartet, the band has developed a reputation for a sound and compositional approach that draws from hip-hop, electronica, jazz, prog rock; but they’re perhaps best known for their jazz-based interpretation of hip-hop tracks, which have allowed them to collaborate with Kendrick Lamar, Tyler The Creator, Earl Sweatshirt, Denzel Curry, Danny Brown, Mick Jenkins, Ghostface Killah and others. Interestingly, the band can trace its origins to when the band’s founding trio bonding over a mutual love of hip-hop – in particular MF Doom and Odd Future.

As the story goes, the then-trio played a piece based on Odd Future’s music for a panel of their jazz performance instructors, who didn’t believe it had much musical value – but interestingly enough, after they released the track as “The Odd Future Sessions, Part 1,” the track caught the attention of Tyler The Creator, who helped the video go viral. The Canadian act followed that up with the 2011 release of their full-length debut BBNG, which featured interpretations of A Tribe Called Quest, Waka Flocka Flame and Odd Future. Building upon a growing profile, the members of BADBADNOTGOOD recorded a live jam session with Tyler The Creator in Sowinski’s basement, with videos from the session amassing more than a million views each.

2012’s sophomore effort BBNG2 was recorded over the course of a ten-hour studio session and featured Leland Whitty (saxophone) and Luan Phung (electric guitar) and featured their own original material, as well as renditions of songs by Kanye West, My Bloody Valentine, James Blake, Earl Sweatshirt and Feist. That year, the band was the official Coachella Festival house band, backing Frank Ocean and Odd Future over the course of its two weekends.

2013 saw the release of III, which featured “Hedron,” a track that was also featured on the compilation album Late Night Tales: Bonobo; “CS60” and “Can’t Leave the Night,” which was released with the B-side “Sustain,” and they were involved on the soundtrack for The Man with the Iron Fists, assisting with the production and composition.

2015’s fourth, full-length album Sour Soul, found them collaborating with Ghostface Killah – and interestingly, the album is more of a hip-hop album that nods at (and is largely influenced by) jazz. They ended the year with covers of a handful of holiday standards, including “Christmas Time Is Here” with Choir! Choir! Choir!

Leland Whitty joined the band as a full-time member in early 2016, and they followed that up with producing “Hoarse” off Earl Sweatshirt’s full-length debut Doris and “GUV’NOR,” a remix, which appeared on JJ DOOM’s Keys to the Kuffs (Butter Edition). By the middle of that year, BADBADNOTGOOD released their fifth full-length album IV, an album that featured guest spots from Future Islands’ Sam Herring, Colin Stetson, Kaytranada,Mick Jenkins and Charlotte Day Wilson, and was named BBC Radio 6’s #1 album of the year.

Interestingly, Thundercat and BADBADNOTGOOD have collaborated on what may arguably be one of the most hotly-anticipated collaborations in recent memory, “King of the Hill,” a track that’s a seamless meshing of Bruner’s soulful and dreamy falsetto with his dexterous bass work, a swaggering, boom-bap like backbeat from BADBADNOTGOOD and an atmospheric and shimmering production from Flying Lotus — and as a result, the track manages to be a soulful yet psychedelic take on jazz fusion that’s retro-futuristic yet incredibly contemporary.

Look for the track to be featured on Brainfeeder Records’ forthcoming 36 track Brainfeeder X compilation, and the compilation which is is slated for a November 16, 2018 release will celebrate the label’s decade of releasing the work of fearless and uncompromisingly forward-looking artists that will be split into volumes — a retrospective of their critically applauded releases and the other featuring even more forward-thinking work and collaborations.

 

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: The Trippy Visuals for Trummor & Orgel’s Trippy “Metropolis”

Since their formation, the Uppsala, Sweden-based sibling duo Trummor & Orgel, comprised of Anders Ljunggren (organ) and Staffan Ljunggreen (drums) have developed a reputation for being one of their homeland’s in-demand instrumental duos, as they’ve collaborated with The Soundtrack of Our Lives’ Ebbot Lundberg, Weeping Willows’ Magnus Carlson and Peter, Bjorn, and John’s Peter Moren among others. Adding to a growing profile, the duo have played hundreds of gigs across the European Union, and they’ve had their music featured on a number of TV shows and movies.

“Metropolis,” the first single off duo’s forthcoming album Indivisibility finds the duo driven by the desire to create something completely original within the limitations of their instrumental setup of drums and organ. In press notes, the duo acknowledge that creatively speaking, freedom and limitation are “two sides of the same coin; music can become incomprehensible without a frame, but without freedom, it becomes fixed. Or if you want to, Yin needs Yang for unity. This has been the leading principle when working with the new album, to find the balance between the organic and the electronic, the dynamic and predictable, now and then; the balance between man and machine.”

Sonically, “Metropolis” finds the duo taking on a cinematic and retro-futuristic sound while nodding at jazz, jazz fusion and funk — but within an arrangement that has the duo walking a tightrope between the immediacy and looseness of two guys jamming in the studio and the deliberate nature of playing a written composition without betraying either. And interestingly enough, the composition also manages to evoke the movements of crowds of humanity rushing to and fro in a busy city. 

The recently released video features this duo performing the song underneath a heavily graffitied up highway underpass, as well as footage of ghostly figures suddenly appearing across the screen and footage of everyday pedestrians walking about a decidedly European city — all of which emphasizes the duo’s trippy sound.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

 

Despite going through a number of lineup changes throughout the years, the New York-based jazz outfit New York Electric Piano, currently comprised of founding members Pat Daughtery (piano) and Aaron Commes (drums), who’s best known for his work in the Spin Doctors, along with newest member Richard Hammond (bass), initially formed in 2003 as a piano jazz trio, based around the Fender Rhodes electric piano sound featuring founding members Daughtery, Comess and Tim Givens (bass). Interestingly, that collaboration can trace its origins back to when the founding trio met, playing in various bands in the NYC music scene during the 90s.

Their eponymous 2004 debut effort was critically applauded and was a commercial success, as it cracked the Top 20 of the CMJ Jazz Charts. 2005’s Citizen Zen and 2006’s Blues in Full Moon were also released to critical praise. And adding to a growing profile, the band began a long residency at the Cutting Room, which featured their tradition of inviting dancers on stage with them. However, by 2008, the band expanded into a sextet as they added Deanna Kirk (vocals), Till Behler (sax) and Leon Gruenbaum (keys), who’s best known as a member of Vernon Reid’s backing band — and as a sextet, they released the critically applauded King Mystery, which found the members of the then-sextet expanding upon their sound and approach with material that shifted between dance rock, jazz and wild freak outs.

By 2010, the band expanded once again as they added Teddy Kumpel (guitar), known as a member of Joe Jackson’s backing band and Erik Lawrence (sax), known as a member of the legendary Levon Helm‘s backing band. And as a nonet, New York Electric Piano began a long and very successful run at Zinc Bar, which they followed with arguably their most commercially successful effort to date, 2011’s double album Keys to the City, which spent a month in the Top 10 of CMJ’s Jazz Charts and received critical praise from the likes of PopMatters, Sea of Tranquility, Jazz Times, Drumhead and All About Jazz among others.

And although the band received quite a bit of commercial and critical success as a large ensemble, they reverted to the original format a trio — recruiting the aforementioned Hammond with whom they released Black Hole In One, an album which featured alternating instrumental compositions and vocal tracks. Unexpectedly, for the members of New York Electric Piano, the album received international attention, thanks in part to album single “Party On.” As the story goes, “Party On” was pushed by an Australian DJ, and eventually the New Zealand National Rugby Team, the All Blacks adopted the song as their theme song during their Rugby World Cup Championship run. Along with that, Lollapalooza artist Norton Wisdom did a live action painting to the song, and the video and song became the subject of a climate change conference at Penn State University. Adding to the unexpected attention on the album, album single “Who Wants to Know” features a verse about Crazy Horse. One of his descendants heard the song and sent it to family members, who were protesting the Dakota Access Pipeline — with the song becoming something of a rallying cry.

Recently, the members of the band have been playing monthly gigs at Rockwood Music Hall, and their extended, free-flowing jams were met with such tremendous audience approval that Aaron Comess immediately suggesting that they needed to try to capture the energy and vibe of their Rockwood shows on their next album — State of the Art, which is slated for a January 12, 2018 release through Fervor Records.

State of the Art‘s latest single “Road to Joy” is a loose and free-flowing jam that displays the trio’s uncanny simpatico, in which they all push and pull upon the other, teasing out ideas from one another, and much like the incredible Xylouris White, there’s a sense that the trio, musically speaking are dancing — with each member knowing exactly when to lead, follow. And although the composition begins with some stuttering discordance, the trio quickly finds a sustained, funky groove reminiscent of 70s era jazz fusion but with a contemporary touch.

 

 

 

 

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Comprised of four long-time friends James Donald, Adam Halliwell, Kevin McDowell and
Tom Shanahan, the Melbourne, Australia-based quartet Mildlife, largely inspired by the likes of Can and Herbie Hancock, bonded over the desire to push musical boundaries as far as possible. And interestingly enough the quartet developed a reputation locally for completely live improvised live sets based around am incredibly unique retro-futuristic sound that draws from, prog rock free jazz, jazz fusion, 70s and 80s synth funk, house music, dream pop and krautrock, while also nodding at contemporaries like Floating Points, Caribou, Drakkar Nowhere and others.

Although the members of the band will openly say that they’re not they’re not a studio band, they did spend 2014-2015 off from live shows so they could figure out how to accurately replicate their live sound within the studio — without losing its complexity and nuance. “It makes the performance, the composition, more malleable,” says guitarist and multi-instrumentalist Adam Halliwell. Bassist Tom Shanahan adds “It feels more authentic. The energy can be in the song rather than sitting on top of it. We wanted to leave a lot of room for improvisation.”

The Melbourne-based quartet’s full-length debut Phase is slated for release sometime early next year through Research Records and the album’s first official single “The Magnificent Moon” is rooted around a expansive and kaleidoscopic composition featuring layers of tight, arpeggiated synths, a sinuous bass line and a propulsive backbeat that’s roomy enough for some funky jazz-like guitar soloing and a cosmic ray-like synth solo, a trippy bridge and razor sharp hooks — and while being decidedly retro-futuristic, the song reveals the members of the Melbourne-based quartet to be among some of their homeland’s most adept and finest musicians, as they manage to walk the difficult tightrope between a deliberately crafted composition and free-flowing improvisation in a way that’s intriguing.