One of the final reside jazz performances I attended, on February 1, 2020, was by a one-off group referred to as Ghidorah that appeared on the Jazz Gallery for 2 nights and has to my information by no means reconvened since. They have been structured just like the three-headed monster that was their namesake, with bassist Eric Wheeler and drummer Rodney Green in again and a trio of tenor saxophonists (with one or one other sometimes doubling on soprano or bass clarinet) up entrance: JD Allen, Stacy Dillard, and the person who put the mission collectively, Marcus Strickland. They performed two units every night time, and on the present I caught, Strickland started issues with a brief dialogue of the historical past of the tenor saxophone and a roll name of legends, together with Coleman Hawkins, Lester Young, Don Byas, John Coltrane and Sonny Rollins, and paying particular tribute to Jimmy Heath, who had died lower than two weeks earlier, on January 19.
I’d been listening to Allen, Dillard, and Strickland for nearly a decade earlier than that night time. Allen is one in every of my favourite jazz musicians, interval; he’s the primary artist featured in my e book Ugly Beauty: Jazz within the twenty first Century. He releases an album a yr, and every one is price your consideration. Dillard has solely made a few albums as a pacesetter, which is a disgrace, however he’s an ace session participant and sideman throughout New York. And Strickland has had a wide-ranging profession, releasing albums on Fresh Sound, Criss Cross, and Blue Note. But lots of his work has come out on his personal Strick Muzik imprint, together with his newest launch, The Universe’s Wildest Dream.
The album options his band Twi-Life and some friends, like guitarist Lionel Loueke and vocalists Christie Dashiell and Ras Stimulant. The core group — keyboardist Mitch Henry, bassist Kyle Miles, and drummer Charles Haynes — first got here collectively on 2016’s Nihil Novi, and labored collectively once more on 2018’s People Of The Sun, each of which have been launched on Blue Note. Those albums supplied a forward-looking mix of jazz, hip-hop, and music from throughout the Black diaspora, roping in people like Bilal, Pharoahe Monch, trumpeter Keyon Harrold, and percussionist Weedie Braimah for essential cameos. Though there’s loads of reside musical interplay on The Universe’s Wildest Dream, it has an much more painstakingly assembled sound, with layers of synth, multi-tracked horns, and overlapping voices and subject recordings. Dashiell’s vocals, on “Matter,” have been captured on the street whereas strolling residence from a Black Lives Matter protest. It’s of a chunk with latest work by artists like Kassa Overall, Robert Glasper (with whom Strickland studied on the New School), Theo Croker and others, who see their music not as “jazz” precisely, however a part of a a lot wider and deeper musical river, and don’t see something bizarre about incorporating the sounds and vibes of the twenty first century into their artwork.
“I think music is definitely directly tied to technology,” Strickland instructed me by cellphone from Florida — he was born in Gainesville, grew up in Miami, and is at the moment instructing on the University of Miami’s Frost School of Music. “When music was delivered on steamboats, the music was a certain way, and it was delivered in a certain way. But we now have playlists, so I think people in general, they vibrate a lot with many different styles of music, all at once. And it’s kinda like the soundtrack to people’s lives these days is not to even really think about genres, it’s to think about a playlist. Like, what would be a great playlist for this moment? And that’s how I put together my records these days. So I’m no longer trying to just stay within a genre. I feel that those days are over; I think that’s a marketing tool. Culturally, a lot of different music is connected together. Black American music, that’s where I’m at, and I also like to blend it with diaspora music, music from all over the world, from people who are connected to Africa. You’ve got Afrobeat, you’ve got compa in Haiti, you’ve got mande music from Mali, all those things are part of the DNA that I’ve grown up with, so I’m just trying to represent myself and my generation as much as possible.”
Although sure tracks sort out race and different social points, the album’s overwhelming message is one in every of environmental concern. “We can talk about how much money this person needs, or about race, or all kinds of things, but all that stuff is not gonna even exist without the preservation of the balance necessary for life on this planet,” Strickland says. He needs to maintain his message constructive — the album title, The Universe’s Wildest Dream, is a reference to the confluence of things that have been essential to make Earth right into a livable surroundings within the first place — however he’s anxious that we’re being distracted by bullshit and within the course of losing time that must be spent fixing Earth, as mirrored within the track “Dust Ball Fantasy,” on which Loueke performs guitar and sings.
“Those little cute stories you’re making up about Mars? You need to give that up right away,” Strickland says. “If you make a refrigerator, that thing breaks down. You make a car, that eventually breaks down. Now if you make a terraforming atmosphere — yeah, that’s gonna break down too. [laughs] So let’s kinda put things in perspective and really concentrate on something worthy of our resources, of our time, of the money of the richest folks on this planet.”
The album is sort of quick — eight tracks in simply 33 minutes. Listening to Strickland and the band make a easy musical assertion, extrapolate on it, and shut it out with no meandering or aimlessness, I used to be reminded of the way in which so many hip-hop songs today appear to be round two minutes lengthy, typically much less. Are we in an period of quick data? Strickland thinks possibly so, and he’s unbothered by that. “Yeah, I think so, because it’s a reflection of where people are at this moment in time, with the emphasis on playlists. People are like yeah, let me just hear this vibe for a little bit and then get to the next thing. It’s kind of like a DJ set. Also, back in the day, Charlie Parker didn’t need that many minutes to convey music that actually changed the world. So I think we should challenge ourselves in that way as well…when you have that kind of concentration, you don’t really need that much time to convey the idea.”
Watch the video for “Amygdala,” which options dancer Madaline “Mad Linez” Riley in a one-take efficiency:
Strickland was a fixture on the New York scene for a few years, however today he’s dwelling in Miami. I used to be curious, given the environmental issues that dominate the brand new document, whether or not he thinks his present house is sustainable. It looks as if each time it rains, Miami’s streets flood just like the canals of Venice. “South Florida will be underwater not that long from now,” he agrees, “because yeah, it’s very close to sea level. I mean, it wasn’t even land when the people who made it into a town got here. It was swampland, and they filled it in. And underneath us is limestone, so it’s not gonna be above water much longer, with all that’s going on. So that’s definitely something that I feel registers, especially with Floridians, but the political climate here is quite counter to [the reality of] climate change. It’s quite counter to sustainability – there’s a general political stance here that just goes against what is actually needed to save the city… So I’m just doing as much as I can with my little corner of the world, my little piece of the pie, I’m trying to do with the platform that I have what I can towards this cause.”
In addition to his personal work, Strickland is part of bassist Christian McBride’s New Jawn, a pianoless quartet that additionally options trumpeter Josh Evans and drummer Nasheet Waits. They launched a self-titled album in 2018 that featured all unique compositions in a way more free and aggressive model than McBride — a genial and swinging participant who favors an old-school method — is often identified for. The New Jawn is an typically fairly raucous band that attracts on the free jazz of Ornette Coleman, Archie Shepp and mid ’60s Sonny Rollins. Their new album Prime, out this month, options variations of Coleman’s “Prime,” organist Larry Young’s “Moonchild,” and Rollins’ “East Broadway Run Down,” in addition to new items by the bandmembers. The McBride unique “Head Bedlam” opens the album, and lives as much as its title:
“The group has done a whole lot of touring since [the first album], so I feel that getting into the groove of the tunes was far easier than before,” Strickland says. “And yeah, every band after some time turns into a household — you get to know one another, particularly on the highway, and thru understanding one another, you type of have a special approach of interacting musically.
“[There’s] definitely a level of surrendering that needs to happen in order to play that way,” he continues. “I can play straight bebop, too; I can play some gospel music, I can play all kinds of styles, but when playing free…it brings us all together in a way that other types of music can’t. You all just really share the moment and that becomes the composition, instead of having a very strict roadmap.”
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