FLYING LOTUS - ‘COSMOGRAMMA’
Published: The Big Issue #355, May/June 2010.
Cosmogramma
Flying Lotus
*****
Much of the hyperbole surrounding Steve Ellison’s meteoric rise from the LA underground has seen the abstract beat conductor, aka Flying Lotus, framed as some kind of alien futurist.
It’s understandable. Spending time with his remarkable third album Cosmogramma is unlike most musical experiences out there. But perhaps what makes Ellison’s negotiations of arcane hip hop, chaotic computer noise, subterranean sub-bass and swooping, soft-lens orchestration so thoroughly engaging is their unlikely, nonetheless tangible lineage to black music’s past.
Indeed, where 1983 (2006) and the much-lauded Los Angeles (2008) saw Ellison –nephew of avant jazz legend Alice Coltrane and grandson of Motown songwriter and producer Marilyn McLeod – recast fluid grooves and glitch-strewn sonic data into a kind of tectonic future hip hop, Cosmogramma mines his family heritage to craft a microchip-heavy, contemporised take on free jazz.
It’s a tumultuous and thoroughly rewarding ride. Cousin Ravi Coltrane contributes some wonderful flourishes of tenor saxophone, while harpist Rebekah Raff, Radiohead’s Thom Yorke and mind-bending bass virtuoso Steve ‘Thundercat’ Bruner (of Sa-Ra Creative Partners) add their own flashes of flavour.
But Ellison is the star here. This is a rare and redefining record. The future and past have never sounded so bizarre, so beautiful and so damn good.
Dan Rule
