Nu Jazz - Civil War (Orange Milk) [Jazz Punk]

Nu Jazz appear are a storied collective from the New York experimental and jazz underground, and whilst I'm not au fait enough with the city's scene to know anything about growling, saying something vocalist Dan Orlwoski, Ben Shirken on machines of various descriptions, banger and shaker of things John Bemis, the hard-blowing Ryan Easter on trumpet, the open-minded Adam Turay on guitar and the propulsive Kevin Eichenberger on bass, they certainly play well together, and I'd sure as hell make sure I got my tickets early for a live show, although I won't hold my breath for them to come to the north of Portugal.

They've got an album dropping on July 24th and after the hard grooving (rhythm section alert), swirling, eventually imploding jazz punk of "369" - the LP's first warning shot, "Civil War" has just dropped to reinforce the album's outsider promise, but if you're after some dinner party jazz turn away now.

Kicking off with metal-like intent the song suddenly hits hard swinging, Afro-guitar infused, agitated yet grooving, machine noise injected jazz punk territory, the perfect foil for Orlwoski's vocal attitude that even the inventive autotune can't disguise, but hold tight for the decent into pure punk meets speed metal meets free jazz meets wall of noise madness that is going to blow up a live show - and this project is undoubtedly best consumed live - before the song harks back to the gateway groove, albeit with the band members all simultaneously coming up on their mushrooms, and letting loose with a psychedelic barrage to melt minds, reprogram everything you've ever learnt, and bolster the ranks of the neo-liberal resistance.

Bring on the album and the northern Portugal tour. Now.

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Playlist Companion

Find them in the Slow Jazz Playlist.