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Jazztronica / 'nu jazz' recommendations?

Rabshakeh

By Rabshakeh
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Rabshakeh Grand Master

Rabshakeh

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My listening sometimes goes down rabbit holes. This week it is the concept of 'jazztronica', i.e. hip hop or electronic music, chilled, glitchy or whatever, that claims jazz lineage. Sometimes called 'nu jazz' (terrible name) or various other titles chosen in the proliferation of the internet age. Seems to have come into existence at some point in the late 00s, and continued in my peripheral vision without me paying much attention to it.

A lot of this stuff is just horrible and vapid chill out background stuff. Like acid jazz before it, most has no jazz in it at all and is just electronica or tepid hip hop beats with a sampled saxophone thrown in from time to time. I have been interested though to find a fair amount where the music does show genuine links to e.g. jazz fusion or to ECM or ACT style jazz, or where the jazz or fusion elements are built into something more interesting and 'new". There is also quite a lot of chopped up producer-ey music that would, if it were released on a label like International Anthem, be received as a new jazz release, but because it is on an electronica label, it is considered something else.

A big and ill defined genre, if it even is that, which can at best be defined with an "I know it when I see" it methodology. I have posted a couple of these in the Listening To thread over the past few days.

Anyway, I suspect that this is not the forum for it (nu jazz seems to be a bit of a Reddit scene) but, given the depth of knowledge on this forum, I thought I would ask if anyone has any good records that they'd recommend from this sort of area. Glitchy or chilled, it's all welcome. There are a few members who I suspect may know some secret good records in this area.

Edit: Also, any records that you think we're foundational or historically to the idea of 'nu jazz'. 

Edited by Rabshakeh
mjazzg Grand Master

mjazzg

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Some names that come immediately to mind, varying degrees of recommendation. Earlier releases better in each case I think

Skalpel

Conjoint

Nils Petter Molvaer

Erik Truffaz

Rabshakeh Grand Master

Rabshakeh

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4 minutes ago, mjazzg said:

Some names that come immediately to mind, varying degrees of recommendation. Earlier releases better in each case I think

Skalpel

Conjoint

Nils Petter Molvaer

Erik Truffaz

Thanks!

Rabshakeh Grand Master

Rabshakeh

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7 minutes ago, mjazzg said:

More specifically,

Han Sotofett & Jaako Eino Kalevi with Andres Loo

Jameszoo - Blind

Jiyu - Caught in the rain at the tea shop

All sit somewhere on the spectrum I think you're describing but in very different places

Thank you.

On the spectrum, it does seem very wide. All of these are apparently "future jazz", which seems to be another name for the same thing.

Which Erik Truffaz albums do you rate?

mjazzg Grand Master

mjazzg

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3 minutes ago, Rabshakeh said:

Thank you.

On the spectrum, it does seem very wide. All of these are apparently "future jazz", which seems to be another name for the same thing.

Which Erik Truffaz albums do you rate?

Truffaz went very soft very quickly to my ears but from memory, and it's a while ago now, this one was listenable (I did say varying levels of recommendation...)

https://www.discogs.com/release/316996-Erik-Truffaz-with-Patrick-Muller-Marcello-Giuliani-Marc-Erbetta-The-Dawn

All the genre names describe jazz instruments wedded to beats of some description as far as I can tell

Rabshakeh Grand Master

Rabshakeh

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3 minutes ago, mjazzg said:

All the genre names describe jazz instruments wedded to beats of some description as far as I can tell

Yeah. Not just samples of jazz music. Despite the -tronica name, there seems to be an emphasis in most of these groups on "real" instruments.

But the actual deployment of the instruments seems to be quite different to jazz. It is a long way divorced from concepts of swing or "soul", but I suppose that if your starting point for jazz is Jan Garbarek or the EST then it makes more sense. Often it seems closer to minimalist composition or new age music to my ears.

Rabshakeh Grand Master

Rabshakeh

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4 hours ago, mjazzg said:

Also from the UK there was Red Snapper, some Mr Scruff and Homelife intersecting with the spectrum.

I remember liking Mr Scruff at the time, probably because he felt different to the prevailing culture of the early 00s. He had a mixtape release that had a Pharaoh Sanders track on it from Journey to the One that was a big important moment for me in my own journey into jazz. Other than that the jazz edge to his music never really occured to me.

I don't really understand why Fourtet doesn't get mentioned as an example of a jazz electronics guy. A lot of the more recent artists sound very influenced by him, and he is a massive jazz fan, who put out those Steve Reid records that I think work pretty well and haven't dated. Perhaps he was too famous and so not fun to put into weird internet genres.

mjazzg Grand Master

mjazzg

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I agree about Hebden, I saw him and Reid live which was excellent. When I first came across him he was playing in a post-rock group, Fridge I think, that had at least one track with a fiery sax solo

I also think that Floating Points is in the discussion too, and before the Sanders hook up

Д.Д. Community Regular

Д.Д.

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This thread prompted me to pull out the Future Sounds of Jazz compilation CDs on Compost label I have from my partying days. I remember quite liking them as background music back in the day (I thought it was better than whatever was being played in the clubs), but today I failed to force myself to listen to them for longer than 10 minutes, even at the background. It's all actually well made (albeit numbingly predictable) stuff, but this whole repetition thing is not something I can tolerate these days. I would not be able to listen to Philip Glass either (Reich maybe). So sorry, no recommendations from my side. I remember early Truffaz was OK.

Oh, I remembered one - Graham Haynes bpm on Knitting Factory. It's not entirely successful, but some of it is quite entertaining:

        

Edited by Д.Д.
JSngry Grand Master

JSngry

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United Future Organization, Kyoto Jazz Massive, Mark de Clive-Lowe (earlier on, he seems to be pivoting more to jazz these days).

And of course... 

Featuring Jazz's own Donny McCaslin!!! 

Quite fond of this too:

 

Rabshakeh Grand Master

Rabshakeh

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19 hours ago, mjazzg said:

Do I really have to call him Flo-Po from now on...?

It's the name his mother gave him.

19 hours ago, Д.Д. said:

 this whole repetition thing is not something I can tolerate these days. I would not be able to listen to Philip Glass either (Reich maybe). 

I find the same with a lot of electronic and hip hop music from the 90s and 00s. It feels very repetitive. That goes for a lot of the jazz and improv music from the same period which was "updating" the music with beats.

I don't think it's the case with hip hop or electronica any more. The rhythms are generally more open and breathe. Whilst a lot of the "nu jazz" stuff I have been listening to is extremely and insufferably beige, at least it doesn't feel locked in.

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