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d i s s i d e n t
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a r t i s t : VA-DJ Smash
t i t l e : Phonography 2
d a t e : 2003
l a b e l : Blue Note
g e n r e : Jazz
r l s. d a t e : Feb/2003
t r a c k s : 15
b i t r a t e : 192kbps
s i z e : 93,2 MB
_______________________________________________________________________
DJ SMASH
Phonography: Volume 2
(Blue Note)
US release date: 25 February 2003
by Marshall Bowden
PopMatters Music Critic
Acid jazz was never really a completely coherent genre. Instead
it presented a grab bag of funky grooves from '60s and '70s
soul jazz artists, spacey jams, hip-hop aesthetics, rapping and
R&B-influenced "urban contemporary" vocals. The early
experiments with combining rap and jazz or jazz and dance music
suffered a bit from the fact that there was no real middle
ground. Those who tried putting jazzy riffs over electronic
dance beats had little real understanding of jazz music, and
few "legit" jazz musicians were even attempting the mix.
Nonetheless, Blue Note Records, true to the vision of its
founder, Alfred Lion, embraced the idea from the start, opening
their vaults to US3 in the early '90s, resulting in the seminal
album Hand on the Torch. That album produced the hit "Cantaloop
(Flip Fantasia)", which was built around the catchy, funky
piano riff and melody of Herbie Hancock's "Cantaloupe Island".
Even before the release of the US3 album, DJ Smash was on
board, doing remix work for Greg Osby's Mantalk album and
working with Bob Belden's projects. Over the course of the
'90s, Smash did extensive remix work for Blue Note artists, and
suddenly realized that he'd collected a profound catalog of
music. He approached Blue Note about a remix album project,
resulting in 2001's Phonography. Now, Smash and Blue Note have
again joined forces to release a second collection, Phonography
2.
Essentially, Phonography 2, like its predecessor, consists of a
number of remixes of tracks by Blue Note artists. Each is
created by a different remixer, (several by Smash himself),
then blended together into a seamless mix. The result is a set
of music that holds the listener's interest yet is never brash
or intrusive. The jazz vibe is what holds the whole thing
together, despite the fact that the remixes are done in a
variety of styles, including drum 'n' bass, techno, hip-hop,
and house.
The set opens with Charlie Hunter's "Street Sounds" on which
Hunter group members Chris Lovejoy and Stephen Chopek play
street-party percussion while Mos Def provides some rhythmic
exhortations. This track demonstrates the overall approach that
the remixers and Smash will take towards most of these tracks
-- low key, respectful, and unobtrusive. Next up is a smooth
"Poetry in Motion", from Greg Osby's Black Book album. On Black
Book, Osby worked on merging spoken word rap/poetry with jazz,
and the results were generally pretty good. This track is
mellow and expansive, the perfect track for a late evening
vibe, as is the next track, Soulive's (with guest Talib Kweli)
"Bridge to Bama (Dub)".
The organ-based groove-jazz of this band receives a pretty
significant workover on this remix by Hi Tek, which
concentrates on a hypnotic guitar loop punctuated by turntable
scratching and some bubbling synthesizer accents and allows
Kweli's exhortations to become part of the sound environment
rather than standing out as a separate entity. We are delivered
smoothly into the opening Fender Rhodes chords of the Bob
Belden Project's version of Prince's "Kiss", remixed by DJ
Smash. This is not a particularly exciting track, doing nothing
to improve on the original while falling short of its
funky-mellow-dance-meets-diva-vocals aspirations. It comes from
Belden's 1993's When Doves Cry: The Music of Prince, and the
world doesn't need ersatz Prince now any more than it did back
then.
But there are better times on the horizon. Erik Truffaz weighs
in with "Magrouni", remixed from his Mantis album by French
rapper/remixer Imhotep. This track is amazing, though it brings
back the comparisons of Truffaz to electric Miles Davis. The
tempo and beat are reminiscent of Davis, as is Erik's open
trumpet sound and the wah-wah work that could have come
straight from Davis's Agharta period. Still, there's no denying
the charm and beauty of this track, which takes us into Blue
Note's international side, further represented by Argentinean
artist Henri Salvador's "Jazz Mediterranee." If this track does
nothing more than whet listeners' appetites for Salvador's
fantastic Blue Note album Room With a View, it is a success.
Joe Clausell is part of a new group of dance mix artists who
emphasize Latin, African, and jazz elements in dance music
rather than the more straightforward 4/4 disco-influenced beat
many American listeners are used to. He brings this sensibility
to New Orleans Mardi Gras Indians the Wild Magnolias' recording
of "Battlefield," which makes perfect sense, given New Orleans'
heavy African and Caribbean influence. We move elegantly into
Marc Moulin's "Step into the Dark," full of house dance beat,
percolating electric piano, and muted (once again,
Miles-reminiscent) trumpet. The track is extremely reminiscent
of St. Germain's work on his Tourist album, which is probably
why Smash follows it with "So Flute" from that very album. The
tracks by Marc Moulin and St. Germain, as well as Goran Kajfes'
"Mesqualero", receive little in the way of remixing, reflecting
in part some new ideas Smash put into play on this second of
the Phonography series. "This time around Smash's idea was to
include not only great new remixes of top Blue Note artists,
but also original versions of tracks that have a foundation in
the jazz meets electronica world. This genre, once given the
misleading tag of 'Acid Jazz' is currently being referred to as
'Nu Jazz,'" says Blue Note's A&R Director Eli Wolf. Semantics
aside (the sound has also been referred to as "jazztronica",
which is the name of an upcoming website and publication on the
music and its historic predecessors, fusion and soul jazz), it
is clear that the wedding of jazz with DJ culture, dance music,
and the creation of electronic soundscapes has produced some of
the most exciting recent music in either genre.
The trip continues with Bobby McFerrin's mysterious "Pat & Joe"
from his vocalese album Without Words, remixed by DJ Smash. A
heavy dance base is laid down over which the ambient flow of
sound, accented by Richard Bona's haunting guitar work and
McFerrin's wordless vocals. Don Byron's "Belmondo's Lip", a
jazzy samba given a trippy, ambient remix by DJ Spooky,
continues to caress the international vibe. By the time we hit
Smash's reworking of Medeski Martin & Wood's "Uninvisible",
with its heavy use of DJ scratching and some spoken word loops,
this mix will have propelled you into outer orbit with its
clever mix of expansive world beats, jazz lounge sensibilities,
and digital aesthetic.
On Phonography, Smash included a house remix of the Bob Belden
Project's version of "Come Together" featuring Dianne Reeves
and Cassandra Wilson. That worked OK, given the somewhat flat
nature of the original (found on Bob Belden Presents:
Strawberry Fields), but the drum 'n' bass deconstruction by DJ
Kingsize featured on Phonography 2 works even better, since it
uses the vocals and other elements of the original primarily as
flavoring for the fast, heavy dance rhythms of the remix. It's
a slight shock to the system after the more middle of the road
grooves of previous tracks, but it's a good listen and sets us
up well for the album's closer, Jason Moran's solo piano
version of "Planet Rock". Given the historic importance of
Afrikaa Bambataa's original recording of "Planet Rock" to dance
music and DJ culture, Moran's version links the music nicely
with the jazz tradition and presents a good closing track for
this mix. Moran recorded the track using prepared piano, where
various objects are inserted in between the piano's strings to
create a percussive sound as well as various tape loops to
supplement his acoustic exploration of the track.
Back in 1970, Ralph J. Gleason wrote in his liner notes for
Bitches Brew that "electric music is the music of this culture
and in the breaking away (not the breaking down) from
previously assumed forms a new kind of music is emerging." That
new kind of music has been emerging steadily since then, and
recordings like Phonograhy Volume 2 present a marker of how far
it has grown since then. I have no doubt that it will continue
to grow and develop despite naysayers on both sides of the
fence. It seems that jazz has found its latest musical
traveling companion in the electronic sounds emerging from DJ
culture, and that culture has found jazz and its relatives an
excellent way to expand its sonic vocabulary and speak to an
ever-widening circle of listeners. What's wrong with that?
ù 21 February 2003
_______________________________________________________________________
01-Charlie Hunter and Mos Def - Street Sounds [02:18]
02-Greg Osby - Poetry In Motion [04:38]
03-Soulive ft. Talib Kweli - Bridge To Bama [03:49]
04-Bob Belden Project - Kiss [04:12]
05-Erik Truffaz - Magrouni [05:04]
06-Henri Salvidor - Jazz Mediterranee [03:11]
07-Wild Magnolias - Battlefield [05:39]
08-Marc Moulin - Into The Dark [04:54]
09-St. Germain - So Flute [06:07]
10-Goran Kajfes - Mesquelero [04:02]
11-Bobby McFerrin - Pat And Joe [05:45]
12-Don Byron - Belmondo's Lip [03:24]
13-Medeski, Martin And Wood - Uninvisible [02:44]
14-Bob Belden Project - Come Together [06:13]
15-Jason Moran - Planet Rock [05:45]
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67:45 min
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