Ultra Review: Snarky Puppy/Metropole Orkest – Sylva

Man, I have been listening to this album for the past month or so and I’m happy I’m finally getting around to talking about it. Many people don’t know that I was raised on Jazz. I knew Miles and Dizzy before Jay and Nas. Even some of the Smooth Jazz stuff (before it became garbo elevator music) scored my life before hip-hop. Rick Braun, Boney James and Incognito were my summer sounds coupled with David Sanborn, Micheal Franks and George Benson in the winter. Jazz reminds me of home. So last year, when I on a whim, listened to Family Dinner by Jazz mega-collective Snarky Puppy, it felt like Mom’s cooking for my ears.

This year the NYC-based group partnered with the Dutch Metropole Orkest to create Sylva, a funk/jazzy/classical hybrid album that pleases with its various influences as much as its scale. By combining the live ambiance of classical, the jam session feel of jazz and the raw theatricality of funk performance Sylva is one of the most refreshing instrumental projects I have heard in a long time.

The first three tracks “Sintra”, “Flight” and “Atchafalaya” all seamlessly blend together making the start of the album slide through your ears like maple Log Cabin over hotcakes. But what’s so cool about it is the three tracks couldn’t be more different. “Sintra” opens slowly, clearly showcasing the Orkest. Its slight Latin bop sending you to the middle of Madrid right after leaving a night at the theater. It kicks quickly in to the funkdified “Flight” which makes it hard to think that the two songs are even created by he same two groups. Then the New Orleans big band themed/Acid Jazz “Atchafalaya” kicks in which mentally takes me back to the “Bouncin’ Back” Mystikal video for some reason. (That’s a good thing).

“Gretel”, the albums low point, suffers from being too bombastic in some ways. In many ways breaking the concentration of the listener with a slow menacing, power track that honestly just feels kinda out of place. Its still not terrible just a bit jarring. However, that track is sandwiched between the masterpieces of the album. The 15-minute long “The Curtain” and the 20-minute long “The Clearing”.

“The Curtain” is a great blend of the power of the Orkest and the subtle coolness of Snarky Puppy. Its a song that many times changes vibe and sounds but keeps the same theme. The trumpet work two minutes in leads to a synthesized forest of sounds, and then ten minutes in, the piano. My god this piano…Even though at this point it barely feels like the same song, you feel like you were on the same journey the entire time. Like a cruise from rocky England to the coasts of Barcelona, same boat, but the ideas are totally different.

“The Clearing” doesn’t have the same dissonance as “The Curtain”. It lets you know what its all about from the start. Like taking that same boat from Barcelona to Cannes. The coupling of the Orkest and Snarky Puppy is fully realized at this point. “The Curtain” feels like a celebration of that fact, a sending off of the partnership and the joy that comes from ending a great show. The feeling you get when your favorite band plays their best jam, then stays on for another 10 minutes just to make sure you get your money’s worth is what “The Curtain” feels like. All the previous themes are revisited and given homage, and by the end you feel as if a idea has been fully realized.

Sylva may only be six tracks long but they are all damn worth the price of admission. The live jam vibe of the entire album enhances Snarky Puppy’s abilities. While the sheer size of the music lets the Metropole Orkest create the ambiance and then immerse you in the music. It’s and album I can see myself sharing with many people for a long time to come simply because i don’t know when something like it will come around again. Do yourself a favor and take 15 mins out of your day and check out this performance of “The Curtain”.

Super Review: Nobody’s Smiling (Limited Edition) – Common

Chicago has had some of its bloodiest years in recent memory. A city plagued by a Wild West mentality where teens are killed at bus stops and over 50 people can be shot over a holiday weekend can create an atmosphere of paranoia and ruthlessness. This is what Common’s Nobody’s Smiling tries to capture.

Coming together with long time collaborators like No I.D. and Cocaine 80’s Nobody’s Smiling is Common’s darkest project to date delving in the elements of Drill music and the laments of Chicago’s youth. In fact, it is the newcomers of Chicago that the rapper wanted to highlight placing the faces of the new artists one the cover and promotional art of the album. The co-signs are laced in the music as well, as Common features Chicagoans Lil Herb and Dreezy on the album.

The project itself is kind of a slow burn, getting better the more you listen to it. At first, it seems like the rhymes are status quo for the MC. “Speak My Piece”, in particular, sounds somewhat pedestrian when compared to other songs. Another miss, “Hustle Harder”, has good intentions but comes of as kind of corny. The middle of the album does get somewhat bogged down by these tracks and seem to break the continuity a bit.

The latter half of the album, however, is incredible. The titular track featuring poet Malik Yusef perfectly captures a mood of aggression and desperation.  Yusef’s contribution hits hard with interjections like

“Now I see how my daddy felt the dark day he discovered that Black Power didn’t keep the lights on”. 

“Kingdom” tells a story of a Chicago youth who was caught up in the streets posthumously wishing his son doesn’t become the same man he was, and the friend who was locked up avenging him. The bonus tracks on the special edition really add another layer to that narrative and really should have been on the original track listing anyway. “Rewind That” contains a really touching tribute to the late J Dilla who passed away in 2006 from lupus.

Nobody’s Smiling is a perfect example of a project you “listen to and don’t skim through”. The instant gratification crowd might not take the time to appreciate the album which would be a HUGE disservice as it really is rather solid. While not a perfect album it has its spots that are brilliant making it one of the better hip-hop releases of the year. If you can make it through the middle of the album and forgive its slowness you are in for a real treat as the album comes to a close.

Check out “Kingdom” below.