Tomorrow Comes the Harvest: Evolution (Axis, 2023)

September 9, 2023 at 12:28 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

Tomorrow Comes the Harvest: Evolution

Tomorrow Comes the Harvest originated with Jeff Mills’ collaboration with the late Tony Allen, as well as keyboard player Jean-Phi Dary. Mills and Dary continued working together after Allen passed away, and they invited other musicians into the fold. Evolution was recorded live in Brussels in 2022, with the duo joined by Prabhu Edouard on tabla and vocals. Entirely improvised, the set is a smoothly flowing river of piano ripples and skittering techno beats, with Edouard’s tabla and rapid chanting being the most ecstatic element. The crowd gets fired up near the end of these long, stretched-out sessions, there seems to be at least one “wooooo!” during the final minutes of most tracks. “Words of Wisdom” has the heaviest techno grooves, but it feels much more spontaneous than Mills’ club-engineered tracks, particularly due to the jazzy pianos and bewildering tabla soloing near the end. “Peace Pipe” is carried by extremely soothing synth chords. “Rising Water” takes lyrics from the Ganesh Incantation, but gets carried off by the beats. A brief reprise focuses more on the incantation, potentially serving as a radio edit of the piece. In all honesty, the time I saw Mills and Dary perform with Allen, it didn’t feel like the three musicians were as much in tune with each other as the trio here.

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The Answer Is In The Beat