Jaga Jazzist
"Animal Chin" CD EP (GSL)
I had always respected GSL for being a label that always released interesting music - even if it wasn't particularly to my liking - and doing it independently. However, this release - as well as a slew of other back catalog albums I had recently ordered - turned my head and perspective completely around. It's an electro-fusion-jazz album with plenty of blip-and-twitter-core and a fair bit of drum and bass which basically means it's a stylistic mess which just so happens to be a brilliant gumbo of skittering beats and soothing jazz textures - think Goldie, Roni Size, Jazzanova and Underworld. This lengthy (nearly 43 minutes) EP is all over the musical map but somehow it all coheres, congealing into a beat-driven mix of 1970s cool jazz and jazzy jungle's decidedly 1990s reworking of it.