6

6.0

UK release date 12.07.2007

Not content with creating the largest collection of alter-egos hip-hop has yet known, Madlib goes overboard for his latest jazz opus and creates ten new groups, the best named of which are The Jahari Massamba Unit and The Last Electro-Acoustic Space Jazz and Percussion Ensemble.

If you are planning on opening a retro-cosmic jazz lounge in the near future, fear not for your performance budget, as all you will need for the first few months is this CD on repeat. You may well find proceedings a tad slow and bland at first but persevere: there’s enough smoked-out jazz groovation here to fill several vintage ’70s Volkswagen buses, and enough of the Beat Conductor’s acute rhythmic sensibility to carry most of the somewhat sparse, meandering melodies. Of course, a large sack of ism might well afford heightened insight into the creative processes at work in its production, and you might want to dig out a beret and shades to benefit from the full experience.
Guest drummers Karriem Riggins and Mamão of the legendary Azymuth are at work somewhere in the astral swirl, but mostly it’s Madlib’s own prodigious multi-instrumental talent sincerely focussed on tootling, bumping and wurbling for an hour and change, and, as (almost) always, worth checking with it.
Words Ewan Hurzami