Jameszoo

Who knows if it’s something in the waters of ’s-Hertogenbosch. This fixation with jagged rhythms and progressive fantasies, centrifugal symphonic forms and tangled electronics. Back in the early 2000s, the town in North Brabant was home to Music For Speakers, the most (avant-)rock-leaning and left-of-center label in all of broken beat. Today, from that same network of bridges and canals comes the project Jameszoo, led by Mitchel Van Dinther and since 2016 happily housed at Brainfeeder — a US-based label run by Flying Lotus and perhaps even more committed to wild hybrids and impossible juxtapositions, right where rhythm turns in on itself.

Like other genre-bending firestarters on the label — Iglooghost, Hiatus Kaiyote, Jaga Jazzist, Louis Cole, Thundercat, Hakushi Hasegawa — Van Dinther defies definition, setting off vivid firework displays of nu jazz, wonky sounds, and total-music ambitions. But once he’s locked down a dazzling formula, he seems to enjoy reshaping it with new inputs. He changes triggers, additives, grain sizes, revealing fresh colors through familiar forms.
He did it first with 2016’s “Fool”, which he re-recorded in 2019 with the Dutch Metropole Orkest. Then came 2022’s “Blind”, and now, three years later, another remake: “Music For 17 Musicians”, a chamber reinterpretation of much of “Blind” alongside the Asko|Schönberg ensemble — and if it’s not a full-blown transformation, it’s close.

Take “Egg Modern”, now the opening track (it was track 5 on “Blind” — yes, even the order got shuffled). From its first clipped staccato notes, it’s the winds that take over: bassoon, clarinet, flute. The music’s floating character, quickly established and maintained throughout the record, echoes minimalist structures — more clearly than in the scrappier originals. Sharp synths give way to orchestral ricochets; invasive electronics are replaced by orderly, no less jarring percussive exchanges. The nod to Steve Reich is overt, in the title and beyond.

Still, “minimalism” is misleading. The record’s sound is overflowing — the whirling open of “Music For Bat Caves”, the zigzagging layers of “Bugatti” — much more in line with totalist trends in contemporary post-minimalism. Think the kaleidoscopic “Central Market” by Tyondai Braxton, the work of Ex-Easter Island Head or Goat, or in a more digital vein, the MIDI overloads of D’Eon, or the epic collage work of Giant Claw and Mc Maguire. It’s a burst of everything, an answer to the horror vacui that lets the rabbit pull anything — and everything — from the hat.

In the saturated jungles of “Bugatti” and “Imps”, not all colors weigh the same. The jazz-wonky direction is anchored by Van Dinther’s touch and an all-star cast: broken beat drum king Richard Spaven, keyboardist Niels Broos (linked to The Alchemist, Daedelus, and Rolrolrol), bassist Petter Eldh and saxophonist Otis Sandsjö — both key players on Anton Eger’s essential “Æ”.

Most of the album is a mutating hyper-fusion gem, where behind-the-beat swing meets lush third-stream textures and sudden bursts of flaschore. Yet where the classical side takes over — “Philip”, the outro to “Big Game”, or the final “Song” — the chaos gives way to poise. Elegance resurfaces, like a hand extended to listeners adrift in the maelstrom. And while “Music For 17 Musicians” lets you wander, it always knows where it’s going.

(English version created with AI-assisted translation)

09/07/2025