Tomorrow is the release date for an album that has been absolutely teased to the brink of delirium. Tom Misch and Yussef Dayes, two British producers and Jazz instrumentalists, will give us a look at the final product of a collaboration that has brought us “Nightrider”, quite possibly the sleekest, stylish, most outrageously dope and laid back Jazz-Hop track ever (that also features one of my favorite rappers Freddie Gibbs). What is most interesting about this song and all the other singles released in anticipation of their full-length LP, is this collaboration started fairly recently, yet the confident and honed sound seems to completely contradict this. It’s evident this album has great promise to be one of the better of 2020 – a year that is already shaping up at least music-wise to be one of the better ones of recent memory. What Kinda Music will undoubtedly be an exploration not just of Jazz music, but the frontiers it has been pushing in the past decade. And although “Nightrider” was the track that really got me giddy, the first single I heard was actually the title-track, which is an infectious blend of Electronica and Jazz marked by a memorably bold slow-build introduction that kicks into one of the funkiest rhythms I have heard in quite some time.
So the genesis of discovery was this: after “What Kinda Music” caught my attention, I visited Tom Misch’s other singles and noticed the common thread of this guy Yussef Dayes featured on all of them. “Lift Off”, “Kyiv”, and “Nightrider” are all fantastic singles, all of which benefited from a nice chemistry between Dayes and Misch. After doing a slight bit of research into Yussef Dayes, you find he is one of the prime figures in what many are calling a “Jazz Renaissance” in Britain – a place of great esteem for the art of Jazz. Dayes is a virtuosic percussionist who seems equally at ease with traditional jazz percussion as the new styles that take the ultra-chic laid back beats popularized by Hip-Hop. Dayes was one-half of the duo Yussef Kamaal that released the critically acclaimed album Black Focus back in 2016. What was clear from that album is that Hip-Hop was a central muse, and the product was something cooler than the other side of the pillow. Yussef Dayes and Kamaal Williams both were drawn to the funkier rhythms of breakbeat and although Kamaal Williams plays the keys on the album, he made his instruments just as syncopated and percussive as the drums, with the same chill posturing as a Rap track. What they ended up with on Black Focus and the follow-up The Return (2018, under just Kamaal’s name) was a sound that could easily be adapted to the Hip-Hop world as well as primed for sampling, remixes, and revisionist Jazz exploration. Unfortunately the two stopped collaborating in 2018, however it seems all the creative energy and innovation in sound that Yussef developed from this relationship was effortlessly translated into his next collaboration with Tom Misch.
What is pretty evident from the previews for the upcoming album is Dayes is the mastermind behind the alluring breakbeats, mixtures of percussion, and polyrhythms contained within. So what I’m clearly hearing are compositions from forward-thinking musicians, wherein Dayes gives us some of the best backing rhythms (either as a subtle backbone or a not so subtle feature element on the tracks) to perfectly complement the arrangements. Misch has been working primarily a keyboardist, guitarist, and central producer, but it’s also clear Dayes was critical to pushing the envelope. They are both embracing the future of Jazz as a bedfellow with Hip-Hop and Electronica, and all the exciting emanations possible from the fusions, however it seems Misch may have never pushed beyond a certain formula if not for the jolt from this collaboration.
Misch’s trajectory as a musician is an intriguing one. He is one of the most promising young musicians not only in Britain (he’s a native of London), but in popular music. At only 24 years of age, his collaborations with GoldLink, Jordan Rakei, and Michael Kiwanuka have brought him a certain level of recognition. Jordan Rakei, and Michael Kiwanuka in particular, along with Yussef Dayes, Kamaal Williams, James Blake, and Jamie Isaac have really pushed the Jazzier branch of Soul/R&B music to the fore again in popular music. Britain and Canada have followed parallel tracks in generating the best of these genres; they both have taken the natural relationship between Jazz, Hip-Hop, Soul, and R&B and mixed it all together into a sleek urban aesthetic. A taste of that pioneering sound of Tom Misch’s kin below:
Back to Mr. Misch: he was a musical prodigy, and started at a young age developing as a multi-instrumentalist with an inclination towards Jazz. At 16 he started releasing music on Soundcloud, and caught the eye of many with a mature sound that made marked gestures to the heritage of traditional Jazz music with a flair for incorporating the modern. His debut LP, Geography (2018) was received positively and included several standout tracks like “It Runs Through Me”, “Lost in Paris”, and “Movie”. Misch has garnered millions of listens on Spotify from that album, however, it’s a far cry from where he has ventured as a musician since that time. In all honesty, the album was good but a little too safe for my taste. It sounded too Adult Contemporary and a bit rigid in its odes to a traditional or regimented form of Jazz. In fact, his previous collection Beat Tape 1 (2014) seemed even more mature than the proper LP that came four years later.
Beat Tape 1 is a really nice groove-based sound proving his virtuoso skills (especially with the guitar, if you hear a track like “Lush Lyfe”) as a musician, but not making many bounds to push the envelope. These albums really didn’t have to, because the appeal is in the smooth and skillful production, incredible musicianship, wise-beyond-years composition, and laid-back groove. The surprising and unexpected aspect of Misch’s career is he has moved in retrograde (to borrow a term from his fellow British R&B star James Blake). Meaning, as he has grown older he has actually gone to a less predictable, more youthful exploration that makes his earliest work feel like the sound of a 40-year old version of himself – all adult and mature. So although both Beat Tape 1 and Geography are excellent albums I will be sure to revisit many times in the future, the main posit in this post is it took this catalyzing collaboration with Yussef Dayes to make something sounding wholly original.
I cannot wait to hear the full album, and to see if any of the unreleased material from the album is better than “What Kinda Music” or “Nightrider”. Both sound daring in two very different ways. “What Kinda Music” feels unhinged with its explosive combining of synths and breakbeat percussion (thanks most likely to Yussef), whereas “Nightrider” is the opposite of explosive- it’s almost too hip and chill for its own good. Its luxuriating sound, with the added credibility Freddie Gibbs brings, makes it trendy in the retro vibe that is so appealing right now. Listen to a song like “Kyiv” and the percussion just jumps out with its dexterity, mixed real high in the final cut. Misch’s guitar work is perfectly adapted to this hipper sound, wailing in the back with a level of reverb and distortion that he finally seems to embrace (and was certainly missing on his earlier stuff). A couple of the other singles that have me completely excited for this album are below. Will they be as dope as “Nightrider”, well…..its gonna be hard, and that music video at the top of the post is unbeatable.
