Music
7 must-listen jazz records from the year so far
A new generation of acts are breaking through, cross-pollinating jazz traditions with grime, rap and soundsystem culture.
By now you'll be aware that jazz is back. In the UK, a brace of acts that came through youth group Tomorrow's Warriors are transforming the sound through the influence of contemporary music like grime, rap and sound system culture. A thriving West Coast scene formed around pioneering musicians like Kamasi Washington and Thundercat continues to bear fruit. And further afield, there were new groups like Tokyo's Rōnin Arkestra or the US-born, India-raised Sarathy Korwar taking up familiar traditions like spiritual and free jazz and nudging them into new territories.
Listen to the New Jazz Styles playlist in the player below.
Listen to a selection of the best new jazz in the player above, then read on for seven stand-out records from 2020 so far.
Moses Boyd – Dark Matter
Moses Boyd
© Press
The debut album proper from South London sticksman and bandleader Moses Boyd is a heroic example of the London jazz scene’s ability to assimilate diverse sounds and styles – and a lot of the London jazz scene are certainly present, with saxophonists Nubya Garcia and Binker Golding, keys player Joe Armon-Jones and tuba player Theon Cross all present.
On the opening Stranger Than Fiction, twinkling spiritual jazz textures blend with ticking grime hats, brass band heft and gorgeous wafts of tenor sax. Y.O.Y.O and BTB draw from the broiling grooves of Nigerian Afrobeat, while there are some fine vocal turns, notably Poppy Ajudha on Shades Of You and Obongjayar on Dancing In The Dark.
Thundercat – It Is What It Is
Thundercat
© Maria Jose Govea
LA native Stephen Bruner is well known as one of music’s most sought-after session players, bringing his wriggly bass lines and compositional chops to records by everyone from Kendrick Lamar to Erykah Badu to the late Mac Miller. But you’d be a fool to overlook his solo albums – and this, his fourth, is one of his best. Songs like Interstellar Love and Dragonball Durag are irresistible blends of jazz fusion virtuosity and soft rock songcraft, Bruner’s thoughts drifting between spiritual contemplation and matters of the heart. At times it’s a drifty, dazed listen but songs like Black Quails – featuring guitarist prodigy Steve Lacy, veteran funk/soul drummer Steve Arrington and Childish Gambino – hit the mark.
Shabaka and the Ancestors – We Are Sent Here By History
Shabaka and the Ancestors
© Leeroy Jason
UK jazz’s philosopher-king, Shabaka Hutchings is undoubtedly one of the central figures behind the sound’s renaissance – a graduate of the influential London organisation Tomorrow’s Warriors and a mighty saxophone presence pealing away at the centre of boundary-pushing ensembles including The Comet Is Coming, Melt Yourself Down and Sons Of Kemet. Here he revives his group Shabaka and the Ancestors, a band of South African players steeped in the griot tradition. The playing is powerful, the sentiments – pioneered by poet Siyabonga Mthembu – contemplative and often deeply sad.
Irreversible Entanglements – Who Sent You?
Irreversible Entanglements
© Bob Sweeney
The Chicago-based ensemble Irreversible Entanglements first played together at a Musicians Against Police Brutality event in 2015. Accordingly, they follow jazz’s long tradition of politicised and liberative music, free in both sound and spirit. The music is fiery and kinetic, morphing between ruminative ambience and squalls of sound. But it’s the words – courtesy of poet Camae Ayewa, aka Moor Mother – through which Irreversible Entanglements really communicate their message: a weighing of past traumas and a vision of potential futures that is both confrontational and stirring in its optimism.
Emma-Jean Thackray – Rain Dance
Emma-Jean Thackray
© Matthew Benson
The London-based bandleader and RBMA alumni Emma-Jean Thackray is going from strength to strength in 2020. Four-track EP Rain Dance finds her further refining her sound, a hazy blend of dreamy keys, effects-soaked brass and voice, tied to a rhythmic chassis informed by funk and disco, UK garage and broken beat. The EP’s closing track, Movementt, shares a name with Thackray’s new Warp-affiliated label, of which this is the first release. “Moves the body, move the mind, move the soul,” chants a voice over a bumping cymbal groove. It’s not just a lyric, it’s a manifesto.
Tom Misch and Yussef Dayes – What Kinda Music
Tom Misch and Yussef Dayes
© Bardha Krasniqi
Yussef Dayes rose to attention as one half of Yussef Kamaal, who minted an instant classic with 2016’s Black Focus, a heady collision of spiritual jazz and London rhythms. Since that project’s unexpected dissolution, we’ve waited eagerly to see the young drummer’s next move. But What Kinda Music – a collaboration with prolific singer-guitarist Tom Misch, released on classic jazz imprint Blue Note – was the album we didn’t know that we wanted. It’s a coolly assured, determinedly laid-back record that draws on jazz, soul, funk and hip-hop – sometimes all at once, as on stand-out track Nightrider, a twilit jammer featuring a cameo from Freddie Gibbs.
Gil Scott Heron – We're New Again: A Reimagining By Makaya McCraven
Makaya McCraven
© Red Bull Music
Truly getting this remarkable record deserves an understanding of the backstory. Back in 2010, XL Records released what would be the final album by Gil Scott Heron – the singer and poet whose run of ‘70s records stand as documentation of the era’s African-American experience. Scott-Heron was tempted out of retirement by XL CEO Richard Russell, who also produced the record in a sleek electronic style. To celebrate the record’s 10th anniversary, Russell passed Scott-Heron’s vocals to Makaya McCraven, a Chicago percussionist and producer who boasts both a deep knowledge of jazz tradition and the seasoned ears of a modern-day beatmaker. His sinuous jazz backdrops, inventive and grooving, add new life to a record that already felt like a minor miracle.
