Daedelus and Kneebody

I’m not gonna sit here and list all the names involved in this Kneedelus project. Who has that kind of time and access to google? 

All you need to know for now is that fucking Daedelus is a god of a producer and his collaborations with the jazzy geniuses of Kneebody go back a while. 

Kneedelus is their first official team up and it is like a tidal wave. The future crested and washed up artifactual bits from an age we’ve yet to live in. 

“Loops” starts out frenetic and organ-driven. Machine-gun drums hit your body in a seizure-inducing barrage. “The Hole” brings the pace down a bit and adds a gravely bottom to its heavy kicks and horn stabs. The hare, breathless from sprinting, takes a moment to catch its breath. The widely shared, “Drum Battle” is the pulse of this collaboration. A perfectly-crafted cocktail of contemplative keys, glitchy twitchy breaks and builds, and horn riffs descended from on high. 

Flying Lotus’s Brainfeeder label is fucking outdoing itself. After Kamasi Washington’s Epic, this project is like the image streaming into the lens of a telescope pointed at tomorrow. This is hip hop’s future. This is jazz’s future. This is music’s future. The true musicianship is what sets producers like Daedelus apart from most. And Kneebody’s prolific body of work will knee you in the balls. To hear these two forces combined must be making the evil that is wack music cower in its Keds.

“Platforming” is boppy and fast and crippling to the nervous system’s ability to ride the lighting. 

“They are We” feels like a downtown street lost in an old photograph. A reminder that the more things change the more things stay foggy and damp and lonely. “Home’s” melancholy sounds like the song’s namesake might be farther away than is desired and that is a sentiment I can very much relate too. After “Home” comes “Move” which also seems like commentary on my life. Just as I find what I think I want, it’s too often time to go. 

Kneedelus rounds out with three more tracks all worthy and cohesive and absolutely stunning. This is the kind of music scene we’ve always wanted. The collaboration between worlds feels momentous. Like one day we’ll look back to here and be like: that’s where all this shit started. I would love to see what the addition of someone like young rapper Milo, or a forward-thinking jazz vocalist could add to the next round, or both. 

The most important thing, outside of the future implications of music, or the commentary on the state of great musical composers and collaborators, is the fucking feelings this record evoked. Kneedelus hits all the right chords. Pulls all the right strings. Toots all the right horns and strokes all the right shafts. When you are done listening all the way through, you will feel spent. Satisfied and alive, but spent. And that’s all I ever ask out of the music that I love.