Color of Noize

コンポーザー、プロデューサー、エレクトリック、アップライト両方巧みに扱い、ジャズ、シネマティック、R&Bなど数々のセッションに呼ばれる名ベーシスト、デリック・ホッジのサード・アルバム。

ジャズの流れ、ヒップホップのグルーヴ、ソウルフルな深み、スピリチュアルな重厚さ、そして創造的な火のような影響力と経験のるつぼを反映。そのサウンドは、より抽象的な言葉で表現するのが一番だとホッジは語る。"それはコントラストであり、美しさであり、混沌であり、自由である。"

ホッジとドン・ウォズの共同プロデュースによる本作は、全編同じライヴ・バンドで録音した初の作品。

Color of Noizeのコンセプトは、音の流動性を受け入れ、その音の発展と解釈に対する集団的な所有感を刺激するもの。ホッジ曰く、「それは私たちの時代に共通するアイデアだと感じている。受け入れることについての新しい芸術的な鼓動。それはすべて、今の精神、考えすぎず、前に進むことに関係している。」

Derrick Hodge is a contemporary musical renaissance man. A top-flight bassist known for his core membership in the Robert Glasper Experiment, he is also a producer, multi-instrumentalist, and composer who has worked with everyone from Common and Terence Blanchard to Maxwell, Terri Lyne Carrington, and Gretchen Parlato. Color of Noize is at once the title of his third album and the name of his band, comprised of pianist/organist Jahari Stampley, keyboardist and synth player Michael Aaberg, drummers Mike Michell and Justin Tyson, and DJ Jahi Sundance on turntables. Hodge plays bass, guitar, keys, and sings. He co-produced the set with Don Was. Color of Noize is the first time Hodge has worked with an outside producer. Cut live in studio, his musicians encountered the music only when they were about to record it; improvised moments are abundant here. Hodge doesnt meld genres, he blurs them in an exotic, resonant, uplifting music of his own. Groove and flow become multivalent expressions of a single creative voice through instrumental hip-hop, contemporary jazz, indie rock, and soul; they emerge to offer emotional depth and spiritual heft. The Cost opens with sampled, fragmented voices hovering above fretless bass, turntables, reverb, wafting organ, and lithe piano, grooving through the studio haze in a thunderous crescendo with lightning-fast breaks and vamps that bind them. First single Not Right Now whispers in with hip-hop beats before Hodges economical bassline becomes the tunes melodic voice. When the band enters, they embellish and expand the harmonic ideas as he improvises. Hodge plays upright bass arco-style alongside his electric on You Could Have Stayed, a soulful ballad that simultaneously evokes R&B and sweet Southern gospel. Commencing quietly as a sparse harmonic notion, organ swells and junglist drumming escalate the tempo as declamatory synths create a maelstrom for furious bass soloing. Second single Heartbeats seemingly appears from the ether with reverbed tom-tom and a hummable bassline tenderly adorned by piano and electronics. It foreshadows Brand New Day, the souled-out acoustic guitar jam driven by a hovering Hammond B-3 to support Hodges singing, as do piano and an elegantly hushed kick drum. His elegantly distorted bass solo breaks it open to impart emotional, spiritual, and carnal truth. Color of Noize pushes past Hodges earlier albums. Its a fully realized project that will appeal to any listener willing to embrace its spontaneity. Even in its rare, chaotic, cascading moments, the album expresses a wholeness most modern musicians are incapable to summon. Hodge is an accommodating, even generous, musical explorer and therefore gets the max from his material, production, playing, and sidemen. Based on its quality, Hodge takes his place in the company of a few visionary peers such as Marcus Miller, Stanley Clarke, Victor Wooten, and the late Mick Karn. ~ Thom Jurek

ブルーノートの先進性を象徴するベーシスト3作目。前作でベーシストならではのアンビエンス感覚が印象的なサウンドスケープでプレイヤー以上にプロデューサーとしての手腕が光っていたが、その音楽性をライヴバンドによる身体性を駆使し次のレベルに引き上げている。ツイン鍵盤、ツインドラムにグラスパー関連の作品で存在感を発揮するDJジャヒ・サンダンスという特殊な編制にストリングスなどを効果的に配し実験的かつ現代音楽的アプローチも試みながら個々のプレイヤビリティを存分に引き出したプログレッシヴな傑作に仕立て上げた。特にタイトル曲の怒涛のインタープレイの応酬には身震いする。
intoxicate (C)片切真吾