~music Listening Club 16 - Body, Mind & Spirit

I haven't had a chance to relisten to the album this week, but I do know this one. If you're into Kamasi Washington you will probably dig Black Renaissance a whole lot.

For more experienced jazz listeners - I recently learned that Woody Shaw played on this. Not sure how that got by me before.

I can't say I'm much of a fan of this, but I'm not very good at articulating my tastes when it comes to jazz. Glad I got to hear it, though. I think my approach to this kind of thing needs to be more focused, I don't think just listening to a lot is helping me get into it beyond things with a ton of crossover appeal.

I'm generally not overly fond of purely instrumental jazz (although this had some vocals ^sampling? thrown in) and I'm also not usually a big fan of modal / improvisational / free jazz, so this album had the cards stacked against it to start for me. Even so, it had some great grooves and I really liked the funk and Afro/Caribbean elements being mixed in, but overall it felt overly screechy (especially the sax) and incredibly repetitive (especially the piano) so overall fell pretty flat for me. With that said, I still listened to it all the way through and will probably go back to this album again at some point since this does feel like one that might actually grow on me the more I listen to it. I just think I don't quite have the ear to fully appreciate it yet.

Thanks for forcing me to broaden my horizons and musical taste yet again @arghdos. ;)

Interesting to see the replies here. I agree that the front half can be a bit slow and lingering, but I kind of enjoy that -- it takes on an almost mantra-esque quality, slowly building and mutating towards the 'freak-out' @Cleb noted. The second half is definitely my favorite part of the album; for one the backing drum/bass lines are far more aggressive (and interesting), and the various players add lots of interesting notes throughout in particular the opening trumpet solo is superb, while the sax solo midway through is screeching and joyous (but I get why that may be a detriment @cfabbro :p)

I do see some of the same Kamasi tendencies that @boredop noted, though to be honest, I've never made it through a full Kamasi album.... generally, they're wayyyyy tooooooo long. I could even see myself feeling that way about this album if it was a double LP, but I think it's (relatively) short length helps keep it way more focused than a typical Kamasi album ends up.

One aspect I'm drawn to is the use of what we today would call Afrofuturism, particularly with the use of spoken-word and thematic use of magic and evocations of 'the future':

Catchily described as a free-jazz What’s Going On, the album has some of the same Afrocentric, free-flowing soulfulness, encouraged by the large crowd of friends and family present at the session. Whereas Gaye’s album was carefully orchestrated however, both tunes that comprise Black Renaissance were unrehearsed. “It was spontaneous, moment to moment,” Whitaker states. “The piano vamp ties it together and Buster brings it in with the bass.” Without question, Buster Williams’s rich-toned acoustic figures are prominent, hooky and ripe for the creative samplist. As the pulse of the twenty-three-minute A-side ebbs and flows, the listener is treated to three long solo sections (Azar Lawrence, Woody Shaw, and David Schnitter), each anchored by Buster Williams’s slinky bass and Whitaker and Billy Hart’s solid accompaniment. Especially vivid is Shaw’s solo, which builds from sparse ragged statements to a blistering, almost distorted rampage, and the dubby echoed interplay of the multi-lingual poets and vocalists. “Two of my ex-wives are on there, saying poetry,” Whitaker proclaims straight-faced. Obviously the man must know something about harmony! The cool rhythmic bed remains solid throughout, and the song ends with a coda where everyone gets loose, aptly illustrating Whitaker’s description of the piece as “Dixieland, circa 1976.”

The fifteen-minute B-side “Magic Ritual” has a loping, heavier percussive 6/8 feel to it, reminiscent of some Ghanian rhythms. Whitaker’s block chords again guide the assembled cast through the sinuous and trancelike progression. This time the horns trade thirty-two-bar solos before vocalists take turns riffing over a modal plateau. Samplists and DJs alike will certainly enjoy the mid-song breakdown introduced by the chant “Beat the drum for today and tomorrow… Beat the drum for the start of the magic ritual.” The heavy percussion obeys the command, stomping and shaking with a fury before Buster Williams finally gets a chance to let loose over light clave and shaker accompaniment.

“Everybody told me it’s ahead of its time,” Whitaker laughs. “With the poets on there, it’s really a rap record if you think about it!” Aficionados may get a chance to hear another intriguing session, heretofore unearthed, that Whitaker put together in 1981. Featuring Gary Bartz and Terumasa Hino, the sound is “much different than Black Renaissance.” Intriguingly, Sybil Thomas is the featured vocalist. The daughter of Stax legend Rufus, her much-loved releases on West End Records include the Garage anthem “Do It to the Music,” recorded under the Raw Silk moniker. “It’s heavy,” Whitaker promises.