Alfa Mist - Variables (2023 Jazz Alternativa) [Flac 24-44]



Artist...............: Alfa mist
Album................: Variables
Genre................: Jazz Alternativa
Source...............: WEBQ
Year.................: 2023
Ripper...............:  &
Codec................: Free Lossless Audio Codec (FLAC)
Version..............: reference libFLAC 1.4.3 20230623
Quality..............: Lossless, (avg. compression: 72 %)
Channels.............: Stereo / 44100 HZ / 24 Bit
Tags.................: -
Information..........: Anti - Epitaph
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2023 Best Abums Series

The symbiotic relationship between hip hop and jazz has such deep roots at
this point that we've seen multiple evolutions of this hybridization: the live
bands who emulate and elaborate on the break-looping structures of the
beat, the producers who use sample-based beats to imitate an ensemble of
musicians, and the composers who take the technologically derived
mechanical reproductions of hip hop production and transmute them into
malleable improvisational structures. East London-rooted
pianist/rapper/composer Alfa Mist's sound seems to acknowledge the moves
his precursors made in all these modes (even when he doesn't always use
them himself) and the ensuing work he's made synthesizes those disparate
approaches into a form of soul-jazz that's in constant recursive
communication with this relationship. If that means Variables simultaneously
evokes the '60s and '70s jazz records beloved by Golden Era producers and
the beats those producers made from those records in the '80s and '90s, it
does so without freezing itself in either of those eras—or even in the super-
mellow post-Dilla/Nujabes "lo-fi beats" atmosphere these hybrids usually
result in. His range is broad but links up ideas in a way that flows logically; the
way "Foreword" presents a traditional bop-rooted charge out the gate and
then switches up its rhythm to a swing-heavy take on trap drums is only the
most audacious example. "The Gist" pulls off a subtler trick to stirring effect,
with the rhythm's cymbal-stuttering fluidity egging on Alfa's electric piano until
its glimmering tone starts radiating volcanic heat. And "BC" hits a sweet spot
of drum'n'bass freneticism and Eddie Henderson-ian cosmic-fusion
atmospherics that quickly unfurls into a spectacularly dynamic succession of
intense solos. But Variables is never content to remain in one mode, and
tracks like the boom-bap Rhodes-and-vibes loner rumination raps "Borderline"
and "4th Feb (Stay Awake)," the highlife-inflected warm drones of Bongeziwe
Mabandla feature "Apho," and Kaya Thomas-Dyke's airy yearning on the
folky R&B of "Aged Eyes" show another way into this world—one where you
don't need to be a crate digger to find new genres to stretch your wings in.
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Tracklist:

  1. Alfa mist - Foreword                                    
  2. Alfa mist - Borderline                                  
  3. Alfa mist & Kaya Thomas-Dyke - Aged Eyes                
  4. Alfa mist - Cycles                                      
  5. Alfa mist - The Gist                                    
  6. Alfa mist - Genda (Go Away)                            
  7. Bongeziwe Mabandla & Alfa mist - Apho                  
  8. Alfa mist - Variables                                  
  9. Alfa mist - 4th Feb (Stay Awake)                        
 10. Alfa mist - BC                                          


Playing Time.........: 44:25
Total Size...........: 491,89 MB