Day 6 of our charity Advent Calendar in aid of The Steve Reid Foundation.
Back for a second year, Glenn Astro originally intended to donate an edit, like last year’s exquisite rework of Erick Cosaque’s Guadeloupe jazz classic ‘Kominike’. That was until Max Graef stepped up with a mini beat tape of original productions and a marker was set. A few days later GA returned with his own challenger. Eight-and-a-half minutes is occupied by murky, lo-fi shuffles, Dām Funk-esque squelches, touches of Rhodes and trumpets. It’s playful, it’s sincere and born out of a friendly rivalry between production partners; not bad for two days work and definitely some potential to explore these ideas into fully-formed tracks.
Here’s what Glenn had to say about the track: “I actually just wanted to see how far I could get with only having a couple of days and also limited amount of time producing a little beat tape. The premise was to not sample any harmonic stuff and also not just do simple boom bap beats… I think it went pretty well in that aspect. I only used a sample for the intro chords.”
Download ‘Productiones Instrumentales (Var. 1)’ from our Bandcamp. It’s pay-what-you-like, with all proceeds going to The Steve Reid Foundation, a charity founded by Gilles Peterson that aims to support musicians in dedication to the visionary jazz drummer.
