Sunday, March 22, 2020

well, i can't say i've heard anything quite like this before, which appears to be a live drummer doing some kind of combination of hip-hop & jazz fusion. you're going to tell me about j dilla & flying lotus, but this isn't like that.

it doesn't really fall in either genre; this isn't a mashup. it's inherently zappaesque, and that is probably the dominant influence, but through some kind of obtuse reliance on his shaggs side. it often came out via george duke, but don't think this is like thundercat - this is weird and the reason it's weird is because it is fully embracing the tonality of hiphop, which is...atonal in a naive way. it's like jazz, in a sense, but in the most simplest way conceivable.

so, if you could take these really unmusical melodies you get in hiphop (often as programmed into a drum or bass machine), and kind of orchestrate them, which includes applying them to the vocal parts, and then layer them over a freeform drummer that's doing improvisational syncopation...

i've never heard anything like this, and i listen to a lot of music, as you can see. maybe some zappa/duke compositions, but it's post-zappa in the sense that the tonality he's pulling from is. if zappa/duke did a hip-hop record? of course zappa would have released some hip-hop records if he lived long enough.

is it compelling?

i'm not sure, yet. that might take a few years to figure out...

it would have been an early show on sunday the 29th but has of course been cancelled. i doubt i'd have gone. but, i am intrigued.

this would have been on the 28th, and i do like the style, but i wonder about the execution. i would probably need this to be an early show in detroit, or maybe at phog. there's just a lot of filler.

when this nonsense is done with, somebody should organize a local jazz fest and get everybody out to one big show.
if they didn't cancel shin guard next friday, i would have ended up down the street at this show after it was done, as the sanctuary closes early.

it's raw and boneheaded and even has difficulties staying in time, but so be it.

and, i would have had to find somewhere to dance until 7 am, after that.