Brian Jackson, Ali Shaheed Muhammad, and Adrian Younge: JID008 (Jazz is Dead)

Brian Jackson, Ali Shaheed Muhammad, and Adrian Younge

JID008

Jazz is Dead

Nov 02, 2021 Web Exclusive By Matthew Berlyant

Living legend Brian Jackson, best known for his collaborations with Gil Scott-Heron from 1971 to 1980 and now based in Portland, Oregon, has released his first album in 20 years and it’s an absolute stunner.

Given that he wrote 80% to 90% of the music for many of Gil Scott-Heron’s most-loved albums, it would certainly be understandable if Jackson wallowed in nostalgia. Back in 2018, for example, he did a weekly residency at New York’s Nublu club that later extended to one in Los Angeles where he played and sang his ’70s compositions written for Scott-Heron. But instead of remaining trapped in previous triumphs, he is (along with his co-collaborators, guitarists/bassists Ali Shaheed Muhammad and Adrian Younge, as well as drummer Malachi Morehead) moving forward, creating an album that combines flourishes of his past as a soul/funk/jazz legend with a very modern, almost retro-futurism that marks it as a current jazz album and not a revivalist effort.

Highlights? There are many here on this short, 32-minute album, starting with the stunning opening tracks “Under the Bridge” and especially “Mars Walk,” which sounds like a perfect soundtrack for that titular event, with Jackson’s otherworldly synth sounds evoking space travel beautifully. The rest of it is just as memorable, with a tribute to the late jazz vocalist “Nancy Wilson” (with Jackson on flute just like on Scott-Heron’s most well-known composition, “The Bottle”) alongside the also stunning closer “Ethiopian Sunshower” and its audible tribute to the wonderful Ethiopian jazz of saxophonist Mulatu Astatke, whose work was given a boost in the 2000s with its inclusion in the film Broken Flowers and on vaunted the Ethiopiques series.

It should also be noted that this part of the Jazz is Dead series and specifically the eighth release in that series. The previous titles in the series also featured contributions by other living legends, such as Roy Ayers, Marcos Valle, Joao Donato, and now Brian Jackson, all backed by Shaheed Muhammad and Younge. (www.jazzisdead.co)

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