Welcome to psychedelic jazz. This site is being started by two members of the long running N.Y.C. band / multimedia ensemble M’lumbo. As our own music and interests have recently turned to Jazz [the early roots of many of our players] and as we’ve always been classified as fairly psychedelic, we thought we would start this blog / site / [perhaps eventually & hopefully] forum about the intersection of these two still fertile fields and ourselves.
What is meant by psychedelic? The term was originally coined as a noun in 1957 by psychiatrist Humphrey Osmond as an alternative descriptor for hallucinogenic drugs in the context of psychedelic psychotherapy.
Well within a decade, it had mimetically evolved into a well-understood adjective, applied and prefixed to transportive works of music and visual art. While the term is primarily attached to a certain sound and period, all music and visual art that transports the listener/viewer in a manner comparable to the psychedelic drug experience can be termed psychedelic, and are easily recognized as such. Thus, many painters and musicians / composers throughout history – of which Salvador Dali, Maurice Ravel, Sun Ra,
Jean Cocteau are but a few examples – while not belonging to the narrow time line of the so-called ‘original’ psychedelic period or adhering to it’s narrower stylistic tropes, are all nevertheless psychedelic as hell.
Likewise for Jazz, despite the music / scene being at it’s most deplorable state yet [at least in America] as far as hipness quotient, relevance and commerciality, it’s history is full of colorful, innovative artists whose techniques and works achieve pictorial, cosmic and spiritual dimensions that propel listeners into a psychedelic zone.
These albums form the spine of a fantastic library of Psychedelic Jazz. Each is a colorful, impassioned and delightful performance (or series of performances) clearly aimed at ‘looking for the stars you can’t see’, to use multi-instrumentalist Eric Dolphy’s felicitous phrase. Each record presents a universe wider than the borders of the medium that contains it, whether LP, CD, MP3s or direct cortical injection. These recordings, which span from the 1920’s to this century, were not just ahead of their time: they are outside of time itself.
Clink the links below for artist information, and for pages where you can listen to and/or purchase the albums and even ‘songs’.
For added enjoyment, several pairs of these videos play well together (simultaneously), so feel free to mash them up. Multiple computers are also fun. Have a psychedelic jazz party – with your friends!
Life After Death
M’Lumbo CD featuring Mission Impossible, the Mickey Mouse theme, the Alfred Hitchcock theme and more
Over One hour of some of the world’s most beloved melodies,
Lovingly and thrillingly performed by the exotic and mysterious M’LUMBO !
Songs include: The Flinstones(swing version), I Love Lucy, Mission Impossible, the Mickey Mouse theme, the Alfred Hitchcock theme and more
What you once thought was order was closer to chaos; what you later came to see as chaos was closer to order. It’s all the same, the look of it depending on where you stand and who you are.
Clifford Thompson was discussing, among other things, the multitudes of jazz. Two multitudes specifically: Duke Ellington and Charles Mingus. In the above quote, the Duke was order and Mingus was chaos, which is to say that Ellington was the chaos that appeared as order and Mingus the order that appeared as chaos. Or could it be the other way around?
Yes it could, and it did just as often as it didn’t. Throughout his essay, Thompson describes the almost caricatural positivity of Duke Ellington, contrasting then with the on- and offstage raucousness of Charles Mingus. The essay culminates…
Listen to 89.9 FM (NYC) or online streaming at WKCR.org this Wednesday 3 – 6pm.
We’ll be playing songs from our new double CD and music we’ll play at our Saturday show.
M’lumbo was founded in the mid-80’s by Robert “M’botto” Ray and “Zombie” Ron Boggs
Rob & Ron
as an escape from commercial music (they were then in, amongst other things, a “rock” band managed by Mick Jagger’s manager that included future Helmet leader Page Hamilton). To their surprise, early handmade cassettes began selling briskly at local record stores leading to radioplay on over 100 U.S. stations and many rave reviews.
They have since been featured on over 300 public, college and progressive radio stations worldwide (including syndicated shows featuring their music); have done commercials, films and work for MTV , MTV 2, Chrysler, Mini Cooper, and Hyundai; and have drawn countless enraptured reviews, received an ocean of comparisons to Miles Davis, Sun Ra and the Orb, and praise from such disparate avatars as Simpsons’ creator Matt Groening, Brian Eno, Carly Simon, DJs Olive and Spooky, Neil Young and Tom Waits, and have influenced some bands along the way (Sex Mob, Either/Orchestra).
They have given countless orgiastic and enthralling performances at both the original and second Knitting Factory, recently played the third (Brooklyn) location, as well as numerous other N.Y.C. venues such as Joe’s Pub, S.O.B.’s, and St. Anne’s Cathedral, with opening acts such as Neotropic, Sean Lennon, Badawi, Mantronix, virtual reality inventor Jaron Lanier, Jojo Meyer’s Nerve, dj Muttamasik and Duncan Sheik with constant recommendations of their shows by Time Out New York and the Village Voice.
In 2000 their film System Noise (with wall-to-wall music and guest appearances by Gary Lucas, Badawi and Neotropic) won ‘best experimental feature’ at the New York International Film Festival, toured as a Slamdance feature and secured European distribution. Following completion of this film, M’lumbo recorded The Nine Billion Names Of God, an album of eight mind-boggling originals which combines accessibility with transportive transcendence that ‘will transport you to M’lumbo’s private twilight zone’ (Boston Herald)
“M’lumbo’s boho splendour! forget the Lounge Lizard’s fake jazz, this is fuck-jazz; highly accomplished and highly irreverent at once ‘Psychotronic’ skit-skatting through the musical spectrum in a hyperactive-inspired burst of creativity and rhythm” (B-Side) “Imagine a collision between Tackhead, Eno-era Talking Heads, Bill Laswell, 70s Miles Davis… Mere words cannot do justice to convey the musical construction that you are going to hear” (Dead Earnest)
M’lumbo “The Nine Billion Names Of God”
M’Lumbo offers up the latest chapter of their luminous journey through cinema, dreams, electronica, accoustica, humour, terror, sprituality, jazz, world, acid rock, drum’n’bass, classical and forms unknown, with each moment stamped, ineluctably and seamlessly. by M’lumbo‘s wild post-everything originality.
The band has over the years in its different incarnations released albums labels such as Warner Brothers, Staalplaat and World Domination. Group members have worked as sideman, directors, editors and sound designers to a host of world-class artists and clients ranging from MTV to Chrysler, ESPN to Abbey Lincoln, Mazda to Luther Vandross, Methodman to Pacha Massive, Gil Evans to P Diddy, Pharrell to Pearl Jam.
Their forays into psychedelic jazz have deepened with recent releases – Sacrifices to the Neon Gods, and The Angel Wars. They have been combining forces with celebrated soprano saxophonist Jane Ira Bloom for recent recordings and performances, the fruits of which can be heard on their brand-new collaborative release Celestial Ghetto.
“M’lumbo takes the familiar and makes the earth slide.”
– New York Newsday
“It’s Mickey Mouse, The Stanford University marching band, Santana and Syd Barrett rolled into one…borders on genius.” – Baltimore City Paper
“M’lumbo makes world music for some world other than Earth.” – Dirty Linen
“To approach a merely adequate description, try and imagine a combination of Miles Davis, Sun Ra traditional African music, and early Bonzo Dog Band…very exciting, filled with unbridled energy and humor. The musicianship is superb and the arrangements exceptionally creative.” – Alternative Press
Taking our own advice from the last paragraph of the previous post, we staged our own psychedelic jazz party. Using YouTube’s ability/loophole to play as many clips at once as possible, we made audio mashups of the videos from our 2nd post, 49 of the Greatest Psychedelic Jazz Albums of All Time, then created accompanying visual mashups of those videos and others from YouTube.
We’re hoping this sparks a new craze. Throw your own psychedelic jazz party! Until you do, enjoy these (psychedelic drugs optional)!
May 15, 2011
psychedelicjazz
leading to radioplay on over 100 U.S. stations and many rave reviews.
.jpg "M'lumbo at S.O.B.'s 2")
