Madlib - Madlib Medicine Show No.8 - Advanced Jazz

There was a time when, in my humble opinion, style and the pure definition of “cool” emanated from every pore of the streets of San Francisco, New Orleans, New York, etc… The first few decades of the latter half of the 20th century were hazy, rooms filled with smoke and the fumes of alcohol, and of course the magnificent sound of jazz.

Sadly, everything and everyone who contributed to the wonder years of jazz, soul and, as one Miles Davis would put it, the birth of cool, it all seems to have evaporated like the smoke escaping upwards from a dying cigar. A few traces of the smell can still be found here and there in today’s scene, now largely occupied by the repetition of hip-hop and more R&B, which all gives me a big headache, to be entirely honest.

It can only be considered as excellent news then when producer Madlib embarked on a particular quest this year, creating and releasing 12 albums throughout the year, one per month. The month of August brought us the fantastic Madlib Medicine Show No. 8 - Advanced Jazz. No. 8, the eighth album of the year on the eighth month, it’s a blessing that seems to have traveled through space from an underground Jazz club in suburban San Francisco.

Advanced Jazz is a 10-track album that goes well over the 1 hour mark, it plays as a tribute to the late 60s and early 70s when the African American community was at its very best in the music scene, creating some of the finest  music that still lives and inspires many. Madlib plays through the tracks skillfully, showing a sharp sense of humour in the first half of the album and a nostalgia for what used to be legal in the 70s. From tracks Miles to Mingus, if you play them with good headphones or a powerful sound system, you will be kicked into trance in nothing but a few seconds as the music plays on smooth Jazz rules but indulges in LSD-induced wackyness.

The second half of the album operates on a more linear note, it’s pure 70s jazz, evoking scenes from Bullit, checkered shirts and New York violence. It’s what would play in the background as Travis Bickle surfs the streets of Brooklyn thinking why would such a place exist on earth, but the sound is so sweet, nothing matters anymore.

This effort at waking a lost instinct is well achieved, and anyone with a nostalgic side for past decades will find in Madlib’s Medicine Show No. 8 a real cure for the itch.

02 - Madlib - Ornette by zibalba1