Music
Press
Music is constantly rootling around in the past for sounds and styles that might appear novel when given a quick makeover and transposed to the present. Even so, it comes as quite a surprise to discover that one of this month's key musical trends is the revival of the brass band ensemble, with the recent release of Sousamaphone by Mancunian "peace-lovin' aggro-jazz" outfit the Riot Jazz Brass Band, soon to be followed by albums from Wisconsin's Youngblood Brass Band and the Hackney Colliery Band, on which hip-hop beats, funk and jazz collide with a tonne of trombones.
The current surge of interest in this sound probably began in 2007, when Robert Luis, a DJ and label owner in Brighton, started playing the now famous cover of Sexual Healing by New Orleans' Hot 8 Brass Band. "There would literally be queues of people asking me what the track was," he says. "No amount of hype, PR or twerking can buy that kind of real and heartfelt dancefloor reaction for a track." Luis promptly signed Hot 8 to his Tru Thoughts label, closely followed by Youngblood Brass Band.
Maybe British ears are already predisposed towards brass band music. Bennie Pete of Hot 8, whose music is all about the rowdiness and tragedy of New Orleans's housing projects, says: "The UK has its own tradition of brass bands, and I think they hear what we are saying on our horns." Not for nothing do TV programmers look to the bandstand when they want to stir our patriotic or nostalgic spirits. Traditional colliery brass bands have always served a community bonding function in this country, not least during the miners' strike – a spirit that was tapped into by the artist Jeremy Deller with his brilliant Acid Brass project covering rave-era classics such as The KLF's What Time Is Love.
Confirming the connection between old and new school brass bands, Steve Pretty of the Hackney Colliery Band recalls playing to a theatre audience of OAPs who were expecting a traditional-style affair, "A guy who must have been at least 85 took off his shirt and started swinging it around his head during one of our rave-inspired encores. It was such a shame when his wife tapped him on the shoulder and said 'No, Gerald'." Whether the parp of the tubas and the cornets really is tapping into something atavistic in the British spirit, or whether, as David Henzie-Skogen of Youngblood suggests, it's a more simple, universal thrill of hearing "music made via the human power of breath and hands, that one feels in the gut", this is music with physical heft in an era of laptop twiddling. It would take a hard heart indeed to watch one of these troupes playing live and not want to join the parade. - The Guardian
Music is constantly rootling around in the past for sounds and styles that might appear novel when given a quick makeover and transposed to the present. Even so, it comes as quite a surprise to discover that one of this month's key musical trends is the revival of the brass band ensemble, with the recent release of Sousamaphone by Mancunian "peace-lovin' aggro-jazz" outfit the Riot Jazz Brass Band, soon to be followed by albums from Wisconsin's Youngblood Brass Band and the Hackney Colliery Band, on which hip-hop beats, funk and jazz collide with a tonne of trombones.
The current surge of interest in this sound probably began in 2007, when Robert Luis, a DJ and label owner in Brighton, started playing the now famous cover of Sexual Healing by New Orleans' Hot 8 Brass Band. "There would literally be queues of people asking me what the track was," he says. "No amount of hype, PR or twerking can buy that kind of real and heartfelt dancefloor reaction for a track." Luis promptly signed Hot 8 to his Tru Thoughts label, closely followed by Youngblood Brass Band.
Maybe British ears are already predisposed towards brass band music. Bennie Pete of Hot 8, whose music is all about the rowdiness and tragedy of New Orleans's housing projects, says: "The UK has its own tradition of brass bands, and I think they hear what we are saying on our horns." Not for nothing do TV programmers look to the bandstand when they want to stir our patriotic or nostalgic spirits. Traditional colliery brass bands have always served a community bonding function in this country, not least during the miners' strike – a spirit that was tapped into by the artist Jeremy Deller with his brilliant Acid Brass project covering rave-era classics such as The KLF's What Time Is Love.
Confirming the connection between old and new school brass bands, Steve Pretty of the Hackney Colliery Band recalls playing to a theatre audience of OAPs who were expecting a traditional-style affair, "A guy who must have been at least 85 took off his shirt and started swinging it around his head during one of our rave-inspired encores. It was such a shame when his wife tapped him on the shoulder and said 'No, Gerald'." Whether the parp of the tubas and the cornets really is tapping into something atavistic in the British spirit, or whether, as David Henzie-Skogen of Youngblood suggests, it's a more simple, universal thrill of hearing "music made via the human power of breath and hands, that one feels in the gut", this is music with physical heft in an era of laptop twiddling. It would take a hard heart indeed to watch one of these troupes playing live and not want to join the parade. - The Guardian
“Ain’t Nobody” is the second single from Youngblood Brass Band’s upcoming album Pax Volumi, due out September 9.
Punk, brass band, hip hop, and improv jazz collide in this ten-piece ensemble comprised of members from all around the USA (Madison, New Orleans, New York, Nashville, Minneapolis, Chicago.)
Youngblood is no ordinary brass band; they’ve been featured by the likes of XLR8R, Dazed, Urb, and NPR, and they continue to wow fans all over the world. This imaginative cover of Chaka Khan’s RnB hit “Ain’t Nobody” is shaping up to be a great way to spend a Sunday. - Indie Shuffle
There’s something to be said about the kind of magic that happens when you get a sonic ensemble like Youngblood Brass Band together. Double the sense of aural wonderment when said band puts down their own spin on an arguable classic like Chaka Khan’s Ain’t Nobody.
The track hits you in the face with YBB’s sense of musicianship and doesn’t let up. After spending the better part of the day programming more laid back, hazy joints for our URB readers, this was a welcome (and energetic) change of pace. Totally something to get you through the rest of the day. With just the right dose of brass and percussive elements carrying through the track, chalk this track up in the win column for the fam with Youngblood Brass Band.
On top of this musical goodie that YBB was gracious enough to drop in our laps, they have announced their tour and the September 10th release of their forthcoming album Pax Volumni via Tru Thoughts. Peep the science below for more info on their tour and a link to pre-order Pax Volumni. - URB Magazine
There’s something to be said about the kind of magic that happens when you get a sonic ensemble like Youngblood Brass Band together. Double the sense of aural wonderment when said band puts down their own spin on an arguable classic like Chaka Khan’s Ain’t Nobody.
The track hits you in the face with YBB’s sense of musicianship and doesn’t let up. After spending the better part of the day programming more laid back, hazy joints for our URB readers, this was a welcome (and energetic) change of pace. Totally something to get you through the rest of the day. With just the right dose of brass and percussive elements carrying through the track, chalk this track up in the win column for the fam with Youngblood Brass Band.
On top of this musical goodie that YBB was gracious enough to drop in our laps, they have announced their tour and the September 10th release of their forthcoming album Pax Volumni via Tru Thoughts. Peep the science below for more info on their tour and a link to pre-order Pax Volumni. - URB Magazine
Discography
Word On The Street ? (CD, Album) E Pluribus Bumpus Music 1998
Unlearn ? (CD) E Pluribus Bumpus Music 2000
Center:Level:Roar ? ? (2 versions) Ozone Music 2003
Live. Places. ? ? (2 versions) Layered Music, PIAS Benelux 2005
Is That A Riot? ? ? (2 versions) Layered Music 2007
Pax Volumi ? (2xLP) Tru Thoughts 2013
Photos
Bio
Youngblood Brass Band flouts convention in an ecstatic, raucous, incendiary fashion, taking the form of a New Orleans brass band and morphing it into a punked-out hip-hop behemoth of groove and purpose. The ten-member ensemble hails from all over the US (Madison, Brooklyn, Nashville, Minneapolis, Chicago) and has been unleashing their crash course in genre-bending on stages worldwide since 2000. What other band can claim the honor of having their music spun by DJs like Questlove (of The Roots), working with hip-hop luminaries like Talib Kweli, having their original compositions performed by student marching bands and jazz ensembles around the globe, and still not be out of place at a punk festival? What other band brings together the ostensibly disparate worlds of the trombone geek and the backpack b-boy?
Youngblood has headlined countless tours in the States and abroad, selling out dates in over 20 countries. Their festival résumé reads like a list of the heaviest music events in the world: Roskilde, Glastonbury, Lowlands, Pukkelpop, SXSW, CMJ, North Sea Jazz, WOMAD...ad infinitum. White-hot live shows secured the band’s status as an incredible group to witness, whether in an intimate club setting or in front of thousands on a festival stage.
YB’s debut album Unlearn was released independently in 2000, featuring collaborations with Talib Kweli (the underground smash “Ya’ll Stay Up”), Mike Ladd, DJ Skooly, and Frank Zappa vocalist Ike Willis. The attention garnered led to a signing with Ozone Music NYC, the revolutionary avant-hip-hop label that introduced the poetic talents of Saul Williams, Company Flow (El-P), Antipop Consortium, Mr. Lif, etc. The acclaimed follow-up (and Ozone debut), 2003’s center:level:roar, saw the band globetrotting to sold out audiences.
Youngblood released two more albums on their own Layered Music imprint: 2005’s Live. Places. and 2007’s Is That a Riot?, both of which accelerated the band’s notoriety as the world’s preeminent live brass band. YBB also continued engaging in frequent educational work, stopping at high schools, universities and institutions to offer workshops on New Orleans music history, jazz improvisation, hip-hop culture and the creative impulse. It is through this work that Youngblood acquired cult status among young musicians, and it can likely be said that no other band has achieved such market infiltration without ever having serious media, industry or publicity support. Perhaps the world secretly desires a music that is honest, intense, danceable, intelligent, and devoid of the self-consciously vain irony that prevails in most current entertainment. Perhaps there is also something to be said for plain old good musicianship, deep beats, and sticking to your guns regardless of what's currently fashionable.
Youngblood's new album (the first in 5 years), Pax Volumi, sees the band partnering with Tru Thoughts, the Brighton UK label which includes a roster ranging from deep soul (Alice Russell) to hip-hop (Ty) to straight up New Orleans brass band (Hot 8)... and the pairing couldn't be more apt. The album sees the band finally achieving in the studio not just its musical, but its productions aims, both capturing the live intensity of the entire band as well as creating beats and rhymes that bang right out of the speakers. It's almost as if the band spent the last 15 years getting ready to become THIS Youngblood Brass Band... as though everything in the past just led up to the creation of an album that defies almost all classification, one that couldn't be made by any other group. On stages in the states and overseas, the verdict has been issued: the band has never sounded so good, live and in the studio, and is still reaching for that new sound.
Whichever it is...the roof-tearing shows, the educational aims, the small town roots, the no-smirks honesty, the fist-pumping anthems for cool kids and geeks alike, Youngblood Brass Band has become an institution, one that demands to be seen and heard. Rigorous dancing is also acceptable.
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