by Kamasi Washington
Kamasi Washington The Epic (PBS feature record)
Flying Lotus’ Brainfeeder label has been putting out some of the most forward-thinking music out since 2008. Home to artists including The Gaslamp Killer, Teebs, Lapalux & Matthewdavid, calling it an electronic music label would only be looking at one side of the coin. It also releases music from the likes of Thundercat, Taylor McFerrin & the late Austin Peralta, putting the label at the forefront of contemporary jazz, and with Flying Lotus’ ancestral roots (he is the nephew of Alice Coltrane) it makes for an exciting time for this music.
Enter Kamasi Washington. At 32, the LA sax player has been bubbling away for the past fifteen years recording on albums for George Duke, Harvey Mason, Snoop Dogg & Robin Thicke to name a few. Two pivotal albums in the past 12 months have also had the Kamasi Washington touch: Flying Lotus’ ‘You’re Dead’ album & Kendrick Lamar’s ‘To Pimp A Butterfly’. Both albums have caused quite the stir in the hip hop, jazz & electronic worlds alike.
This seems great timing for Washington to release his own debut long player. Backed by a 32-piece orchestra & a 20-piece choir, this 172 minute album lives up to it’s title ‘The Epic’. Washington’s mission on this album is ‘to remove jazz from the shelf of relics and make it new, unexpected, and dangerous again.’ That he certainly has done. With eight of the seventeen tracks going over 11 minutes in length, it is quite a task to take everything in during a single listen, but this album deserves many, many listens as there is simply so much going on that deserves your attention. While there aren’t any of the Flylo style beats you might expect from a Brainfeeder release, the intensity you expect from the label is present here, yet in a straight-up jazz context.
Kamasi Washington seems intent on breathing new life into jazz in 2015 with some breathtaking music here, and by releasing it on Brainfeeder will no doubt bring along a new legion of fans from the electronic side curious about America’s greatest original art form.
By Mike Gurrieri – Mystic Brew
Tim Willis & The End Night and Day (Featured on The Breakfast Spread)
Tim Willis was awarded the prestigious PBS Young Elder of Jazz Award in 2013. The commission that resulted from that award was a work called ‘Night and Day’ and now finally in 2015 we have a studio recording of this fully-developed suite of music for Willis and his band The End.
The album Night and Day features the six movements that made up the original composition that premiered at the 2013 Melbourne International Jazz Festival, as well as two additional tracks. More than 2 years since that concert the vibrancy, energy and dynamic pulse of that performance is captured compellingly on this studio album. Some of the players have changed but the group dynamic that exists on this recording is still incredibly coherent. Willis has always given space to his collaborators but unlike many jazz bands this is often manifest in driving ensemble grooves rather than a succession of instrumental solos. The result is an album that truly rocks.
Tim Willis takes the role of composer and ensemble leader for this project. Night and Day also sees him expand his capacities as a soloist with some blistering lines that are fluid and confident. Willis’s muscular guitar tones give this album some real grunt and the addition of a second guitarist in the ensemble further enhances the driving rhythms of bassist Gareth Hill and drummer Sam Young. As the titles of each movement on this album indicate, there’s darkness and the dawn, daylight and the night.
There’s simply so much to like about Night and Day. I had the great pleasure of hearing its first performance at Bennett’s Lane back in 2013. Now anybody who missed that concert has the chance to turn it up loud and be reminded why the considerable talents of Tim Willis were recognized by the Young Elder of Jazz judges in the first place.
Assertive, bold and dynamic Night and Day truly packs a punch.
Owen McKern
Program Manager
PBS 106.7FM
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