Why is contemporary music obsessed with jazz?
Jazz has been around for a very long time, taking on many different guises over the years. Originating in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana, in the late 19th and early 20th century, it emerged from blues and ragtime. Since its cultural explosion of the ‘Jazz Age’ in the 1920s, it has been a popular form of musical expression worldwide. Its most famous characteristics include swing and blue notes, complex chords, polyrhythms and improvisation, bridging the European understanding of harmony with African rhythms.
Whilst jazz has long been popular, its connection to music theory and a general view that it is rather pretentious led to it being decried by many, often dictated by a subscription to a certain subculture or the dedication to being ‘cool’ in whatever zeitgeist it may be.
In a 2015 op-ed for the BBC, Washington Post columnist Justin Moyer explained why he hates jazz, opening his account by comparing it to the dinosaur. He said: “When I was a kid, no one I knew listened to jazz. Jazz, like the dinosaur, existed long ago – an obscure genre occasionally namechecked in Rolling Stone when rock guitarists pretentiously expressed a desire to play more like saxophonists such as Charlie Parker or Ornette Coleman. Jazz hasn’t been popular for a long time – and certainly, no one buys it: Miles Davis’s Kind of Blue, the best-selling jazz album of all time, sold about 4 million copies in the US, while Alanis Morissette’s Jagged Little Pill sold more than 15 million.”
In that piece, Moyer noted being derided for an earlier one he’d written in August 2014, All what Jazz?. In that one, he referenced another article purportedly by jazz great Sonny Rollins – Sonny Rollins: In His Own Words – published in The New Yorker the previous month.
“Jazz might be the stupidest thing anyone ever came up with,” reads a portion of the article. “The band starts a song, but then everything falls apart, and the musicians just play whatever they want for as long they can stand it. People take turns noodling around, and once they run out of ideas and have to stop, the audience claps. I’m getting angry just thinking about it.”
This piece was satire. It was penned by Django Gold of The Onion and was part of The New Yorker’s Shouts & Murmurs humour blog. Nevertheless, it was important for two reasons. The first was that it perfectly captured why some people hate jazz. The second was that it showed how divided society is over the genre, prompting a furious response from its defenders. Rollins passionately replied too. Whilst noting its comedic value, he maintained that it seemed to ridicule jazz music “a little bit too much”. Jazz fans also went mad on the internet. The tag #rollinstruth trended, which some on the other side understood as ironic because it was true, as they said; jazz had run out of ideas but was still being defended to the hilt by losers.
Jazz hadn’t really run out of ideas, though. Objectively, those saying so must have been living under a rock or in denial. In March of that year, Kendrick Lamar released his modern masterpiece, To Pimp a Butterfly. Primarily a hip-hop record, the platinum-selling opus draws heavily on jazz and other styles spanning the history of African-American music and blends them with thought-provoking political lyrics. Utterly game-changing, it changed rap and popular music for the better.
The album was so steeped in jazz that its expansive lineup featured guitarist Keith Askey, trumpeter Ambrose Akinmusire, bassist Chris Smith and drummer Robert Searight. Additionally, one of its many producers was Terrace Martin, a renowned hip-hop producer and a multi-instrumentalist with a defining penchant for jazz. Elsewhere, lauded American saxophonist Kamasi Washington served as musical director on the album.
Together, Washington and Kendrick, alongside contemporaries like Flying Lotus – John Coltrane’s nephew – and Thundercat, as well as older statesmen such as J Dilla, Biggie and Rakim, were instrumental in bridging the gap between jazz and popular music. Their efforts spread the message that jazz can be refreshing when used adroitly. Washington told The Guardian in October 2016: “We’ve now got a whole generation of jazz musicians who have been brought up with hip-hop. We’ve grown up alongside rappers and DJs, we’ve heard this music all our life. We are as fluent in J Dilla and Dr Dre as we are in Mingus and Coltrane.”
“Whether I’m working with Herbie Hancock, Kendrick Lamar or Flying Lotus, I try to get on that person’s soundwave and keep my mind open to what he or she is hearing,” Washington told the publication. “You might be a gifted jazz improviser, for instance, but hip-hop will teach you how to edit yourself, how to connect to an audience, how to service a song. That is always crucial.”
This open-mindedness of the African-American musicians above has been a critical factor in facilitating jazz permeating music and the broader cultural discourse since 2015. Another significant part of this has been that the age of the rigid subculture is dead, meaning that people are freer than they’ve ever been regarding what music they can like. With streaming apps such as Spotify now dominating the market and how we consume, countless possibilities for our listening habits exist, with jazz and classical two genres enjoying a resurgence.
Stirred in for extra flavour is the reality that we are now firmly in the postmodern age. Artists are plucking from various places to create kaleidoscopic work relative to themselves and their personal experiences. Not only is the subculture dead, but a general penchant for pushing the boundaries of form and tradition underpins much of what we hear today, with many acts considered at the forefront of music cherrypicking from areas they see fit, whether it’s jazz, metal or electronic. Naturally, this has seen people revisit acts steeped in jazz and the avant-garde. Miles Davis, Frank Zappa, The Sun Ra Arkestra, the Mahavishnu Orchestra, Charles Mingus, Harold Budd, and King Crimson have all returned to the fore, with the former’s 1970 record, Bitches Brew, now a popular talking point – pulled from the fringes and finding love with a new generation.
This has seen ideas from jazz fusion, such as mixed meters, odd time signatures, syncopation and complex harmonies, used by bands such as Black Midi, Black Country, New Road and Moreish Idols. Whilst none of these bands are outright jazz outfits, they draw on concepts from the genre when necessary, creating a three-dimensional and often stark sound, increasing the scope of what contemporary popular music can be.
Acts such as these, and others tied into the most recent post-punk wave – a genre formed as a boundary-pusher – have used jazz as a weapon to challenge the norm. Elsewhere Sons of Kemet, Yussef Dayes – tutored by Miles Davis’ drummer Billy Cobham – and Floating Points’ 2021 album Promises with late jazz hero Pharoah Sanders and the London Symphony Orchestra have all been a part of contemporary music spreading the gospel of jazz.
The truth is, jazz will always be a part of the music scene owing to both its classic status and its devotion to evolution. It is both the blueprint for popular music’s foundations and a part of the fundamental plans for progress.
