17 Dec Jacob Collier – Djesse Vol. 3 – Album Review
Jacob Collier, producer; Ben Bloomberg & Jacob Collier, engineers/mixers; Jacob Collier, songwriter; Chris Allgood & Emily Lazar, mastering engineers
It’s a good sign for humanity when a genius like Jacob Collier gets the attention that comes with a Grammy Nomination for Album of the Year. The dynamic, multi-instrumentalist with a vocal range of an alien and the composition abilities of Quincy Jones on hallucinogens has been consistently blowing the minds of musicians for several years now. It will be interesting to see how non musicians receive what many musicians see as a masterpiece.
Djesse Vol. 3 is the third record of a four album concept project that was released by Collier in August 2020 and was put in motion in October 2018 with Djesse Vol. 1. Not only did the album get the nod for Album Of the Year but it also received Grammy nominations for Best R&B Performance with the song “All I Need” and Best Arrangement, Instrumental and Vocals for “He Won’t Hold You.”
While some classify this album as R&B, when you dig in to the album listeners will find elebments of classical music, gospel, jazz, folk, rock, rap, electronic and more. For some listeners the album may qualify as sensory overload as every track is thoroughly produced with enough layers to make your mexican bean dip seem oddly plain and one dimensional.
Djesse Vol. 1 dives into an orchestral space, while Djesse Vol. 2 finds itself as simplified as Collier can get with a songwriter approach taken. Djesse Vol. 3 goes head first into a digital space laced with funk, hiphop and R&B. The soulful approach to this 12 track album is accentuated by the bevy of special guests that include Daniel Caesar, Kimbra, Tarriona “Tank” Ball, Ty Dolla $ign, Mahalia, and Tori Kelly.
While there is a chance alot of nuance of this album will be lost on the average listener, Djesse Vol. 3 will no doubt cast a new light on the unique virtuoso that everyone agrees has a level of talent that is impossible to quantify for the absurdity of Jacob Collier’s endless creativity.
Jacob Collier https://www.jacobcollier.com/
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