Jazzanova - Electronic Jazz (Germany)

Jazzanova is many things to many different people. For more than fifteen years the eclectic collective from Berlin has been busy producing, composing, arranging, remixing, DJing and generally shaping our musical world – in the clubs, on the air, in the studio, live on stage, and with their label Sonar Kollektiv. 

Though Jazzanova's underground credibility and respect among fellow artists never wavered during the late '90s, the German six-piece waited a long time to release a proper full-length (reportedly, it required five years of recording). In Between certainly proves the wait was worth it; the collective has not only a Teutonic efficiency for creating complex, precise, detailed beat tracks -- recalling the earthier side of house, hip-hop, and jazz fusion -- but also the wisdom to focus away from music that sounds like it came out of a laboratory. On the surface, "No Use" is just another smooth acid jazz number with a sensuous female vocal and a depth-plumbing bassline; in the hands of Jazzanova, though, it's transformed into a work of real beauty, an impeccable production with countless touches embellishing the percussion in a way that few acts have been able to do (Nuyorican Soul and 4hero are really the only others in the same league). "The One-Tet," a rap track, features a pair of battling drum breaks and glorious stuttered effects over the awed rapping of Capitol A (unsurprisingly, the production overwhelms the vocal). Beside providing the house and acid jazz equivalent of Kruder & Dorfmeister's sublime deconstructions of dub and hip-hop, the Jazzanova revolution focuses squarely on the drum. Piano, Rhodes keyboards, and acoustic guitar are mostly untouched, along with the songwriting and structure; the percussion and programming, however, are forward-thinking to the point of incomprehension. The only problem here is the length: as usually befalls an ambitious dance record (to say nothing of one that was years in the making), In Between is easily twice as long as it should be. (One hint: program out tracks seven through 13, but leave in nine and 11.)

In Between