Jel: Late Pass (Anticon, 2013)
November 29, 2013 at 8:07 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment
Jel: Late Pass
First proper full-length from sampler-wielding Anticon veteran Jel since 2006’s
Soft Money. He’s still sticking to the SP1200 he’s had since he was a teenager, and he’s still pushing the limits of what can be done with the instrument. There’s also plenty of soft-spoken rapping/singing on this album, and the lyrics are listed in the liner notes without designating which tracks they’re from. Both “Late Pass” and “Breathe” find Jel warning us “don’t get too comfortable”, with “Late Pass” in the context of a swampy, dubby hip-hop track with semi-instructional lyrics, and in “Breathe” being the only lyrics of a swift, forward-looking instrumental with a bit of noir-ish guitar. “thnk4u” is a short, uptempo breaky instrumental with lots of scratching and some obscured vocals. Tracks 3-5 get into more lyrical territory, with “Look Up” having a detailed beat in line with other recent works by longtime members of the Anticon stable. The track also seems to weave a pretty impressive tight web of instrumentation, with distorted organ, guitar and horns, making it hard to tell what’s being played by what instrument, or if they’re even those instruments at all.
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