Lady Blackbird - Black Acid Soul

    Lady Blackbird – Black Acid Soul

    01 Dec

    By

    Label: Foundation Music – FM0008
    Format: Vinyl, LP, Album, Limited Edition, Stereo, Orange
    Country: UK
    Released: Sep 3, 2021
    Genre: Jazz, Funk / Soul
    Style: Contemporary Jazz, Soul-Jazz

     

    Flying high…
    So why you wanna fly, Blackbird?
    You ain’t ever gonna fly
    You ain’t ever gonna fly

    So sings Marley Monroe AKA Lady Blackbird.

    Munroe’s album Black Acid Soul arrived unannounced as a gift from a dear friend in Sydney who is one of my musical influencers having introduced me to a bunch of new music over the years.

    Within the last 2 months this album has quickly become my 2021 album of the year (War on Drugs latest is the other contender). Everyone whose heard it quickly falls in love with the music and interpretations of classic Nina Simone and Sam Cooke works among the tracks.

    At Nirvana Sound we love new music (and all those amazing reissues and One-Steps and Half Speeds and state of the art Electric Recording Company cuts on single sides). But sometimes out of nowhere a non-audiophile grade record arrives which has all the great hallmarks of a decent cut.

    Yes you’ll get a few pops and crackles extra but the underlying recording has been done right. How do we verify this? Well, its written in the liner notes. Bernie’s listed there.

    Bernie Grundman the legendary LA based mastering engineer is no stranger to many of our community. He’s been part of the vinyl resurgence scene in the US as a central contributor to getting the medium to sound amazing by careful mastering and sensitive curation of sometimes vintage tape materials from jazz masters.

    You’ll see his name attached to many audiophile reissues. He’s worked recently with Lyn Stanley another LA based Jazz artist whose albums are of superb sonic quality.

    I wasn’t expecting Bernie’s place to be used to master this record after Seth Atkins Horan recorded and mixed it at Sunset Studio’s in LA (another famous recording space). This rich acoustical venue and mastering space is now focused behind a younger Jazz Soul singer also from LA named Marley Munroe who goes by the artist name Lady Blackbird. Bernie has worked some magic here to get a non-audiophile record to deliver audiophile cues in spades.

    There’s a timeless quality to the arrangements with some incredible piano solos carefully underpinning the plaintive nature of a lot of the pieces. Deep raw double bass bows raise some ghosts from the days of Billie Holiday and Nina Simone. Soft percussive brushwork adds the coolness to each piece. Some London jazz influences can be heard (think The Cinematic Orchestra and Shabaka Hutchings). I also highlight the Deron Johnson (listed as the pianist) interludes. Going to dig out what he’s been involved with as his song lines are laced through the album. He lets the space between the notes happen. It all works together to be both old and so new at the same time. Sunday morning coffee is sweeter with this album wafting through quietly or if earlier with the owls down low on Sunday 1 am with a single malt going slowly.

    Lady Blackbird’s voice is tinged with smoke and whiskey but can reach otherworldly notes. She connects with the material in ways which suggest she’s lived the lyrics.

    A standout opening track Blackbird is also a good indicator of system resolving power and hall space artefacts with instrument placements and room boundaries visible on topflight systems. You can be transported to inside the studio. Good systems will render the tall ceiling in Sunset and better systems will separate the piano off to the side and right sized. Vocal backing singers will arrange as a choir in the back of the studio with drum and bass also blending in realistically. Vocal lead will appear magically before you.

    Try the title track https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xkuqQifTC_k. Even on streaming sources like Tidal through a decent DAC you’ll be entranced by this recording.

    So why you wanna fly, Blackbird?
    You ain’t ever gonna fly
    You ain’t ever gonna fly

    Marley Munroe (now Lady Blackbird) mastered a variety of genres before hitting the Jazz scene in early 2020. She has been quoted as saying “I feel like I came out of the womb singing – that’s the biggest thing and the main thing that I remember of my childhood. Always singing. Always a lover of music.”

    I for one am glad her spirit survived the journey to arrive to adult consciousness and share her voice with us (mere mortals).

    All I can say is this artist can make you fly high once acquired.

    BTW if you purchase the albums from her Bandcamp site you’re supporting her as directly as possible as a vinyl buyer. Get them before they fly away!

    Track listing

    A1 Blackbird 4:00
    A2 It’s Not That Easy 3:00
    A3 Fix It 4:50
    A4 Ruler Of My Heart 3:42
    A5 Nobody’s Sweetheart 3:38
    B1 Collage 3:17
    B2 Five Feet Tall 3:20
    B3 Lost And Looking 4:21
    B4 It’ll Never Happen Again 3:38
    B5 Beware The Stranger 4:13
    B6 Black Acid Soul 3:54

    Recorded At: Sunset Sound
    Mixed At: Gnu Gnome, Los Angeles, CA
    Mastered At: Bernie Grundman Mastering
    Exclusive Retailer: Bandcamp

    Credits

    A&R – Ross Allen
    Double Bass – Jon Flaugher*
    Drums, Percussion – Jimmy Paxson
    Mastered By – Bernie Grundman
    Piano, Mellotron, Synth – Deron Johnson
    Producer, Acoustic Guitar, Electric Guitar – Chris Seefried
    Recorded By, Mixed By – Seth Atkins Horan*
    Trumpet – Troy “Trombone Shorty” Andrews*

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