There are times where I take a chance on an album by the cover artwork and how catchy the name sounds. This is one of those times where the words Machine and Jazz were brought together and piqued my interest. Honestly, I wasn’t sure what I would be in for, maybe some musique concrète and if that was the case I would be quickly making a lateral pass to Scott to continue his education and avoid sustaining any anguish by furthering mine. However, the mustachioed man on the cover lead me to think that this album might be something entirely different, possibly something weird and wonderful like The Pinker Tones.

The challenge facing me in listening to the album is my lack of perspective. I have never heard of the group before and added to that this is a remix album so context is lacking. Adding a dash of frustration is the fact that my Google-Fu is weak today and the most information that I can dredge up from the Internets® are European record shops and the band’s page which is all in French. Luckily, the band took pity on those who lack a more through education in language and drafted a brief biography in English and encapsulated in a PDF.

Sayag Jazz Machine bills itself as exploring “jazz and bossa roots to feed into the sextet’s alchemy of jungle, electro and drum ‘n’ bass,” which is in fact a very apt description. Anachro’mix Experiences is like a group of Turntablists and Junglists raiding crates of cabaret music from the 20’s and 30’s all amidst a wild carnival like atmosphere. It is uninhibited, bold, loud, bizarre, mysterious, and intoxicating like a bottle of absinthe deep in the night. For example, the track “Eely Gep” plays like Rova Saxaphone Quartet’s “Suite for a Better World” being worked over by DJ Shadow and then in turn passed on to Aphex Twin. Mind numbing.

The pace of the album swirls about wildly from the secretive opening numbers like “Flipper Down (Memories Mix)” where the lyrics boast about the happy days that lie just ahead but in contrast the music belies a tension and a darker almost Gothic mood which contradicts that optimism. That darkness is not necessarily so black or heavy that it becomes unbearable. It is sly, sophisticated, and possibly just a touch weary which allow the beats to continue bouncing along like a carnival barker beckoning in the n^th crowd that evening. “Zapata (2600 mix)” features a lyrical soprano saxophone line that soars over the breakbeat but eventually gives way to sleepy trumpet that waves the listener along with little energy; the youthful went on break yielding to the tired and slightly bored.

It is the contrast of textures and sounds that makes this album so enticing. The juxtaposition of Cabaret, Downtempo, Hip-Hop, and Jungle is a compelling take on music and gives the feeling that Sayag Jazz Machine has a great sense of humor when they approach composing from a modern-retro-futurism perspective. While we have not yet pulled into the third month of this year Anachro’mix Experiences is on my list for Best of 2006. It is just that good.

For a taste of Sayag Jazz Machine head over to their website and check out the eight free MP3s their as well as two videos. As for me, I am going see if I can get their other albums imported to the musically bankrupt suburbs of Connecticut.

The thing about J-Live that strikes me the most is his ability to make his words dance. There is a sort of alchemy that takes place when the words move from the page to the mic where they come alive swinging, swaying, and skipping about the beats where other emcees just hold onto the beat to carry them through to the end.  J-Live bobs and weaves about it occasionally mockingly as he drops into other voices, other times driving the beat along with his double-time patter. On The Hear After, which dropped in late summer last year, he maintains that ability as well as weaving a multitude of new stories about the New York Philadelphia corridor expounding on social issues as well as relating personal stories such as his time spent teaching in the Brooklyn public school system.

Production on the album is solid as most tracks lock in tightly to the rhymes supporting the emcees, never overpowering them or taking away from their work. “Whoever” has the backing track that stands out the most for me with it swaying Latin rhythms that are evocative of a summer’s afternoon at a Nuyorcian block party. Brass lines punctuate the syllables of the rhymes, timbales add bounce, and all while flutes swirl about like a light breeze. The track is infectious particularly as it rounds the corner to the last bars hammering the chorus home like a band vamping as the finale nears.

Usually, I dislike skits or tracks that are built around the skit concept as they often become tired over repeated listenings however the piece that he put together with his wife, Kola Rock. “Listening” is an intimate number, playing out as a long distance call home where the two trade stanzas, building the threads into a cohesive whole that stresses the importance of listening in order to learn about what has brought them to the place in which they now stand. Kola Rock demonstrates herself as a talented emcee and poet.  I am hopeful that her work will see a release of its own in the near future.

The Hear After is not an album for those who are wrapped up in the mindset that Hip-Hop needs to be about slinging rocks and flashing Glocks, as he stresses in “Sidewalks” not everyone is willing to play into stereotypes and on this album he certainly does not pander to the images playing out on MTV. That said, The Hear After is an album that begs to be listened to as J-Live proves himself to be highly literate and an extremely capable emcee.