LIRA
RECOMMENDS!
MESHELL NDEGEOCELLO/THE SPIRIT MUSIC JAMIA
Dance of
the infidels
Universal
Bass player
Meshell Ndegeocello follows her own path. Besides guest appearances with David
Bowie and other well known musicians, she has since her debut in 1993 released
solo albums every three years, on the borderline between funk, soul and
avantgarde. Most well-known is Peace Beyond Passion from ’96.
This time,
she takes a big leap towards jazz and has already received considerable
attention within the jazz circuit with Dance Of The Infidels. Not only because
of guests like Jack DeJohnette, Mino Cinelu, Oliver Lake, Kenny Garrett etc but
especially because it’s a very exciting record with a unique sound.
On many of
the tracks Meshell is not playing the bass, instead this is taken care of
by Matthew Garrison (Jimmy’s son) or
sometimes by both of them together. But she has produced, composed, programmed,
inviting this combination of musicians, thus creating her futuristic sound.
Three vocalists, among them Cassandra Wilson, sing one tune each, the rest are
instrumentals. For example Cooking with Gene Lake, son of Oliver but more known
for his alert drumming on the borderline of funk, bop and avantgarde with,
among others, Steve Coleman.
This is a
wonderful example of what can happen when you open the doors between the
different rooms in the large house of music. Tones and rhythms are pouring out,
mixing, making all meaningless labels just blow away in the wind...
Annika Westman
Published
in Lira Magazine #4/2005