Max Jaffe’s “You Want That Too!” Is a Fearless Exploration of Sound, Silence, and Collaboration

Eclectic, tuneful, and exuberant, You Want That Too! — the new album from drummer, producer, and composer Max Jaffe — feels less like a record and more like a living conversation. Recorded with producer Pete Min at Lucy’s Meat Market studio in Los Angeles, the ten-track collection is the result of a deeply open creative process — one rooted in curiosity, connection, and the joy of discovery.

“The collaborators tell a story,” Jaffe says. And what a cast it is: Jeff Parker, Meg Duffy, Gavin Gamboa, Daniel Rotem, Shelley Burgon, Spencer Zahn, and Logan Kane all lend their voices to the project. Some are longtime acquaintances finally crossing paths; others are new connections found in the studio’s gravitational field. Together, they form a radiant network of sound — what Jaffe calls “the great cosmic conversation that is music.”

At the core of that conversation are Jaffe and Min. But, as Jaffe explains, “the center itself is nothing at all.” Each piece began from silence — a daily ritual of erasure and renewal. “Every morning we’d start fresh,” he says. “A new day, a new track, a new chance to build from nothing.” The result is what he describes as “a process-driven experiment,” and it’s easy to hear: You Want That Too! is alive with the energy of risk-taking and play.

The record is propulsive but often dreamlike, blending space jazz textures and glitch-funk grooves with an elastic sense of time and tone. It’s the sound of exploration with purpose — reminiscent at times of early Warp Records, or the boundary-pushing spirit of Josh Johnson’s “Unusual Object” and Steph Richards’ “Power Vibe” (which Jaffe also played on). Where those albums carve deep into singular sound worlds, Jaffe’s thrives in its eclecticism — a curated spectrum of moods and styles bound together by curiosity and craft.

Tracks like “Looking at the Inside of Your Eyelids” and “Putney Waltz” form a compelling duo — meditative yet rhythmically alive — while “Ancestral Creeks” channels something ancestral and raw, like a lost transmission between past and present. Jaffe’s drumming anchors the album’s cosmic wanderings, but there’s also something deeply personal at play. “My last record, Reduction of Man, was an elegy to my twenties in pre-pandemic NYC,” he says. “It felt like a capstone — like something I’d built was covered in ash. You Want That Too! is me building on top of that ash. Not a complete fresh start, but a new story.”

It’s a story told through sound and silence, through improvisation and intention. A record with no rigid concept but a clear sense of self — the musical DNA of both Jaffe and Min woven into every moment of spontaneity.

You Want That Too! is out November 21, with two singles leading the way: “In Green” (Oct 8) and “S-NARE” (Oct 29).

About the singles:

“In Green and its buoyant groove can serve as a personal flotation device,” says Jaffe. “Strap in and drift downstream through moments of improvisational wonder provided by Jeff Parker, Daniel Rotem, and Logan Kane.”

On “S-NARE”: “Early Warp Records and my work with electronic drum sensors informed this drum freakout. Pete pushed me to lean into the kind of drumming that first hooked me — immediate, hard, driving. The snare has a history of leading armies into battle; this one leads with love, but it can draw blood too.”

You Want That Too! is an invitation — to listen closely, to let go, and to rediscover what music can be when it’s guided by both openness and intention.