Vintage Track: Billy Gault “Mode For Trane”
On March 25, UK imprint Jazzman Records released the fourth installment of its Spiritual Jazz compilation series. Volume 4 focuses on performances of American artists while playing abroad. It’s a much more accessible batch of tunes than the meditative, modal and religious jazz that comprised Volume 3. The latest release features an eclectic cast of heavy hitters ranging from Sun Ra to Albert Ayler to Sahib Shihab.
One highlight from the collection that caught my ear was “Mode for Trane” by pianist Billy Gault. The track was culled from Gault’s lone solo LP in 1975’s When Destiny Calls. The album was originally released on Denmark’s SteepleChase Records, before Inner City Records handled U.S. distribution the following year. Info on Gault beyond When Destiny Calls is limited, although I found several bits of info online that suggest he changed his name to Kalim Zarif and has enjoyed a long career both teaching and performing jazz.
Joe Lee Wilson and Ellen DeLeston handle the vocal work on “Mode for Trane.” Wilson’s career as a baritone, though rarely celebrated outside circles of jazz aficionados, is more widely known than Gault’s. Part African American and part Creek Native American, Wilson was born to farming parents in Bristow, OK before leaving home at 15 to pursue a career in music. Wilson is perhaps best known for his collaboration with saxophonist Archie Shepp on albums like Things Have Got to Change and A Touch of the Blues. Wilson’s storied career is covered brilliantly in a 2011 obituary from The Guardian. Listen to “Mode for Trane” below and grab your copy of Spiritual Jazz 4 from Jazzman Records.
Written by Rob Peoni
Album Review: Aeon Grey ‘Lead Breakfast’
Aeon Grey is an artist who just recently hit my radar. A multi-talented rapper/producer and veteran of the Des Moines, Iowa hip hop collective Maxilla Blue, Grey’s creative use of live instrumentation (especially guitar) is the hallmark of the sound of his new album Lead Breakfast. Reportedly seven years in the making, Lead Breakfast has a polished feel relative to typical underground hip hop albums. Aeon may not be the most talented rapper in the world, but he more than makes up for any lack of versatility or skill with an incredible attention to detail. This allows him to layer his verses with a lot of clever wordplay and concepts that reward repeat listening. The production is the first thing that grabs your attention, but Aeon’s visual couplets reveal him as a talented and thoughtful writer. Aeon’s full commitment to the project is evident, as every song stands on its own, but they work even better together and form a world that truly encapsulates the listener. Lead Breakfast is the sound of a confident artist throwing his cards on the table and not holding anything back.
Even though it has been over half a decade in the making, Lead Breakfast sounds like it was made in and for the present. Several of the prominent themes found on Cult Favorite’s album of the year contender For Madmen Only pop up here as well. Aeon rhymes about avoiding complacency over the blaring trumpet of the opener “Bleedout.” T-he hard hitting “Orphan Donor” finds Grey explaining why he has no desire to follow anyone who promises the notion of forever in exchange for belief. Rappers have been mixing philosophical wisdom into their rhymes for years, but MC’s like Aeon Grey and Elucid incorporate philosophy into their work on both a micro and macro level, demonstrating how a person’s environment affects their perspective and how an awareness of one’s environment can lead to wisdom. Aeon has a lot of questions he asks of himself and of the world and he encourages listeners to do the same.
While Lead Breakfast is packed with rhymes designed to make you think, its driving production makes sure it hits you on a guttural level as well. Several songs have instrumental breakdowns and irregular song structures giving the LP a psychedelic feel. “Madness” and “High Calibre” immediately stood out because of their endlessly enjoyable beats. “Madness” employs a crunchy guitar riff and looping feedback before ending with a guitar solo complete with spacey effects. Aeon pleas for people to “just act human” in this world where “We devour car payment debt in our aging skin/ and starve age from kids like they’re the ones that need to adjust”. Grey’s menacing beat for “High Calibre” is matched by his equally menacing delivery. His tightly packed, wordplay-rich flow on the song is his best vocal performance on the album and puts him in the same pocket as other information overload MC’s like El-P and billy woods. It’s the type of song where it’s impossible to catch all the great lines on the first few spins, but even after the first verse of the first listen it’s easy to pick up on the level of skill on display.
Aeon Grey shows throughout Lead Breakfast that he’s more than capable of holding down an album by himself, but he’s also at home rocking alongside other MC’s. Only two tracks feature guests, but they serve as two of the best songs on the album. “About Time” reunites Aeon with his partner from Maxilla Blue, Asphate Woodhavet. The song is the closest the album comes to a traditional hip hop banger, and the duo use the up-tempo production as a display of their creative rhyme schemes and wordplay. The album’s closer “Wizard’s Curtain” serves as a posse cut of sorts featuring two of his label mates from Uncommon Records, Short Fuze and Taiyamo Denku. The song’s sick bass line and stabbing piano chords make it my favorite production on an album filled with great beats. All three MC’s bring their A-game and give the label a signature song that closes Lead Breakfast leaving the listener wanting more.
If you’re tired of rappers who “live life nearsighted on the wave of a trend” and are looking for some truly progressive hip hop, Aeon Grey’s Lead Breakfast is an album you need to hear. Go pick it up over at Uncommon Records’ Bandcamp for 7.99 and find out why.
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Written by John Bugbee
Album Review: Cult Favorite ‘For Madmen Only’
Knowing versus believing. The nature of truth. Having vision and being accountable to it. Perspective’s impact on complacency. These are the types of themes and concepts that run wild through Brooklyn MC Elucid’s rhymes. The yin to producer A.M. Breakups yang, Elucid shows throughout For Madmen Only, the duo’s first album as Cult Favorite, that not only is he one of the best MC’s in the world, he is a flat out brilliant writer no matter how you classify his words. Elucid’s past tendency to rhyme mostly over busy, glitch-hop beats may have provided him the aesthetic that he desired, but it often shrouded his abilities to all but the most adventurous hip hop listeners. At first listen, A.M. Breakups production might sound similar to the electronic production that Elucid is used to rocking over, but A.M. is incredibly versatile as a producer and knows how to capture a vibe while making sure that he’s still showcasing the MC that he happens to be working with.
For Madmen Only is a quick listen at almost 36 minutes, but it’s been two years in the making and is about as dense as a 9 song LP can get. Throughout the album Elucid and A.M. consistently seek to explore the varying gaps between perception and reality (Elucid through his rhymes and A.M. through his atmospheres and clever vocal sampling). Elucid is especially adept at getting a listener to look at the world through a different lens while infusing his own hard earned knowledge and philosophies. A.M. Breakups’ lifelike production is the perfect setting for Elucid’s parables and helps give the album an ageless quality. A.M. also contributes an excellent instrumental track, “Planet Earth About To Be Recycled”, that is reminiscent of MF DOOM’s legendary sample based collages from the King Geedorah album.
Right from the jump Elucid lays out the album’s concept. “People’s Temple” is a song that immediately reminded me of John Hawkes chilling portrayal of a horrific cult leader in the 2011 film “Martha Marcy May Marlene”. Elucid rhymes, “Catch them preying upon the lost/ Speaking to your distortion/ Sheep ‘ll follow for fortune/ Seek until they’re exhausted/ Pay till they can’t afford it”, laying out a devious depiction that could really just as easily be applied to an opportunistic pastor as an evil sociopath. Elucid then follows with the messiah’s mantra- “Fear not you are perfection/ Would you die for my message?/ After all that I’ve invested?” before repeating his own commentary- “For who so ever believes.” This stretches the concept even farther showing how manipulation can turn a mere mortal into a godlike figure. Elucid has a curiosity for the gray areas in life and an ability to show how wide or how narrow the spectrum of these gray areas can be.
“Then He Rose” is another standout song that features metaphorical religious imagery. This time Elucid uses the track as an exhibit of his outstanding wordplay, depicting himself as a Christ-like figure on the mic. A line like “Still cut the cards I’m dealt/ shuffle, perspectives tilt” might not resonate at first, but the more you dwell on it the more impact it has. Conversely, when he rhymes “rappers hocking poppycock/ my cosmic slop layered like a Basquiat” the impact is immediate, but equally impressive. Perhaps the best display of Elucid’s unique vocal talents, “Then He Rose” is also a prime example of A.M. Breakups ability to have a lot going on in a track, but still not make it sound overwhelmingly dissonant. No matter how experimental A.M.’s production gets, he never loses the melodic root that his music grows out of.
The album’s lone guest appearance comes from Thoughts On Tracks favorites billy woods on “Omega3”, who seems to have found a kindred spirit in Elucid. Woods has worked with both A.M. Breakups and Elucid in the past and plans to release a collaborative EP with Elucid later this year. Billy is the type of MC that tends to outshine most MC’s that get on a track with him, but Elucid has always held his own alongside woods. “Omega3” is no exception, as Elucid spits my favorite verse on the album. He opens the song with the lines- “Have you ever asked a redneck how his sister taste?/ I just got called a n***** and that really made my fucking day/ I smiled for a second, asked the aforementioned question/ First time when I was 6 alone in my daddy’s green cutlass/ wouldn’t say it corrupted barely knew what it meant honestly/ just an old white man walking past, I’m far from Rockaway” Elucid’s vivid reflective verse was the result of a self-described “shitty customer service job experience where (he) was racially harangued on the phone”. The eye opening verse shows off Elucid’s development as an MC and his ability to turn a common life experience into a compelling artistic statement.
Elucid’s gruff delivery and apparent indignation might be the first thing that grabs your attention on For Madmen Only, but it belies a strong emotional core that allows him to be revealingly honest about every aspect of his life. His vulnerability in relationships with the opposite sex is made clear on a few occasions, especially on “For All Of These Birds”. While the song is a virtual kaleidoscope of Elucid’s personal philosophies, the end of the first verse details an exchange with an ex that was particularly memorable for Elucid. Although he seemed committed to putting the relationship behind him, her closing salvo “You are what you attract and I be back on the reg” left him questioning how much control he truly has of his life and relationships.
Cult Favorite’s music allows a lot of room for personal interpretation, but For Madmen Only closes with its clearest statement “Mollywhop”. While both Elucid and A.M. usually tend toward the abstract, on “Mollywhop” they take a more traditional route to making a classic hip hop song. A.M.’s stripped down beat gives Elucid room to drop jewels like “Whatever truth is, shouldn’t need to be explained” and my favorite bars of 2013 to this point, “5000 years they been talking ‘bout the last days/ I don’t hear a word of it/ Talking crazy, “Melo kinda hurt the Knicks””. Elucid and A.M. Breakups are fully committed to their vision, a fact that may not help their bandwagon in the present, but will only help it grow in the future. Cult Favorite’s debut album may be a culmination of years of hard work from two talented artists, but it feels like the genesis of a new chapter in the bible of hip hop. Stream For Madmen Only below and cop the limited edition vinyl over at CultFavorite.com.
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Written by John Bugbee
Thought on Tracks 