Philip Bailey, the brilliant falsetto voice behind Earth,
Wind & Fire, is an American music legend. The 8-time Grammy Award winning
recording artist, songwriter and producer has influenced music artists and a
popular culture over the past five decades. Growing up in Denver, Colorado Bailey
listened to R&B, gospel, rock and pop alongside what he refers to as real
jazz: Miles, Coltrane, Art Blakey, immortal jazz singers like Sarah Vaughan,
Nancy Wilson and Dinah Washington.
Love Will Find a Way, Bailey’s newest solo album on Verve
Records (June 21) is a continuation of his musical exploration and another step
in his solo career. The album features trusted friends like bassist Christian
McBride, iconic jazz pianist Chick Corea and drum legend Steve Gadd. Bailey
also tapped several of the brightest contemporary lights in jazz, R&B, pop
and more as collaborators: keyboardist Robert Glasper, saxophonist Kamasi
Washington, rapper, musician and producer will.i.am, trumpeter Christian Scott
aTunde Adjuah, singer-songwriter Bilal, singer-saxophonist Casey Benjamin,
guitarist Lionel Loueke, drummer Kendrick Scott and bassist Derrick Hodge,
among others.
Bailey says the album, “There was a flow to the project that
was reminiscent of back in the day, when we used to do those records with the
Fire and we had what I call our A-team. This record is opening up real vivid
possibilities of where I’m going from here. I see a runway that will allow me
to build on this vision.”
On Love Will Find a Way, Bailey proves that the atmosphere
and ideas that made Earth Wind & Fire possible—a respect for genuine
musicianship, a conviction that all music matters—are alive and well in 2019.
“It was a mutual admiration society—for real,” says Bailey,
67 At the same time, Bailey was struck by the sheer newness he heard around
him: “Artists like Robert and Kamasi and Christian, they embrace the nuances of
jazz and its historical value, but they’ve really infused the game with new
possibilities. And I’ve been the recipient of infusion.”
Above and beyond its genre-bending, cross-generational
musical synthesis, Love Will Find a Way also addresses these troubled and
divisive times. In Bailey’s poignant interpretations of songs like Curtis
Mayfield’s “Billy Jack” and “We’re a Winner” and the Abbey Lincoln/Max
Roach-associated “Long as You’re Living,” he addresses pertinent themes of
social justice and self-empowerment. At its core, rather than becoming mired in
politics, Bailey’s message is one of optimism for all humanity. “That’s in
keeping with my philosophy and Earth Wind & Fire’s philosophy,” he says.
“It was something that is a continual thread of what we’ve done over our almost
50-year career. So that’s just staying true to who I am.”
Love Will Find a Way came together over a two-year period,
and was initiated after Bailey started becoming aware of this forward-looking,
all-embracing jazz generation. “I’d heard Rob Glasper was giving jazz a
facelift,” Bailey says, and after attending the keyboardist’s live show, he was
sold. Not only was the music hot and progressive, but the crowd was hip,
diverse, youthful and passionate. Bailey quickly brought Glasper on board to
play on and produce some tracks, and he became invaluable to the singer in recruiting
musicians and other decisions. But Bailey also continued with his own research.
At Jazz Fest in New Orleans, he made a point of catching Kamasi Washington’s
set and had a small-world moment. “Lo and behold, he introduced his father,
[the woodwinds player Rickey Washington]. Me and Rickey had known each other
for years!” Bailey recalls, chuckling. “We went to the same church! Kamasi went
to bible school with my kids.” A who’s who of musicians, producers and
arrangers became involved over time, including keyboardist-arranger Herman
Jackson, vocal producer Harvey Mason Jr., jazz-piano stalwart Kenny Barron,
drummer Teddy Campbell and Bailey’s wife, vocalist Valerie Bailey, to name just
a few.
The album kicks off with a West African-tinged take on Mayfield’s
“Billy Jack,” a perfect opportunity for Bailey to pay homage to perhaps his
greatest falsetto influence. Bailey and Corea look back to the heyday of jazz
fusion with a sweetly grooving rendition of the Return to Forever classic
“You’re Everything.” Bilal provides gorgeous vocal backing for Bailey on
Mayfield’s “We’re a Winner,” before Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah, on plangent
trumpet, and will.i.am, laying down a tribal beat on drums, highlight the
mostly instrumental “Stairway to the Stars.” On “Brooklyn Blues,” Bailey uses
his Kalimba to create a meditative ambiance atop simmering 21st-century jazz
rhythms. Talking Heads’ “Once in a Lifetime” is reinvented here as an
atmospheric slow jam, with spoken word by Bailey. “Just to Keep You Satisfied”
is a beautifully reverent tribute to Bailey’s idol Marvin Gaye. Kamasi
Washington’s robust tenor saxophone is an impeccable match for the ’70s-tinted
spiritual vibe of “Sacred Sounds.” On the title track, Pharoah Sanders’ “Love
Will Find a Way,” Bailey’s falsetto finds a sublime complement in Casey
Benjamin’s saxophone and Vocoder. And he looks to famed bassist and
collaborator Christian McBride to properly funk up “Long As Your Living.”
McBride says of Bailey and the Earth, Wind & Fire
legacy, “I can’t think of any other group that did such a masterful job at
combining all these different elements of jazz, the avant-garde, African music,
Brazilian music, funk and rock.”
Bailey, Verdine White and Ralph Johnson continue to carry
the torch for the group’s late founder, Maurice White, at packed halls and
amphitheaters around the world. The group thrives today as Recording Academy
Lifetime Achievement Award winners, Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductees and
one of the best-selling bands in the history of recorded music.
Away from Earth Wind & Fire, Bailey has also found
tremendous success. His 1984 duet with Phil Collins, “Easy Lover,” became a
worldwide No. 1 smash, and he’s recorded acclaimed albums in gospel and jazz.
In the latter genre, Bailey released Dreams in 1999 and Soul on Jazz in 2002,
in addition to collaborations with Stanley Turrentine, Dianne Reeves, Fourplay,
George Duke and Stanley Clarke, Nancy Wilson and others. Still, nothing has
compared to Love Will Find a Way.
No comments:
Post a Comment