When Kendrick Lamar and Chance the Rapper tapped into their cities’ homegrown jazz scenes, it proved mutually beneficial for the rappers and their collaborators alike. Their breakout works were strengthened by a century-old musical heritage, and newer jazz artists like Kamasi Washington and Donnie Trumpet & the Social Experiment got the chance to shine on their own. Over the past few years, Chicago trumpeter Will Miller has shared the stage with everyone from Whitney to Lil Wayne, A$AP Rocky to the late Mac Miller. Taking lessons from indie rock and hip-hop and infusing the resulting hybrids with his own sensibilities, Miller now steps out as a bandleader with Resavoir. His group draws on the tradition established by other fine Chicago jazz-inflected exports over the years (Rotary Connection, Tortoise, Earth, Wind & Fire) while also pushing beyond categorical boundaries to create a debut that is soulful and ear-catching.
Like his fellow International Anthem labelmate Makaya McCraven, Miller deftly draws upon spontaneous improvisation and methodical studio wizardry alike, melding the two practices together (as well as 18 different players) to create an amalgam stronger and sweeter than the sum of its parts. On “Resavoir,” he toggles between crisp beats and sunny 1960s pop, expertly arranged jazz-funk and experimental electronic textures, but its five minutes feel breezy and conversational rather than overstuffed with details. Subtle but deft jump cuts detour from soaring to meditative and back, with plenty of room for instantly hummable horn charts as well as field recordings of gulls and airy vocal harmonies that drift like afternoon clouds. It’s a complex piece of songcraft that also feels dreamy and sunlit.
On standout “Taking Flight,” harpist Brandee Younger evokes both the ethereal glissandos of Alice Coltrane and the head-nodding soul-jazz of Dorothy Ashby. In surrounding Younger with expertly arranged horns and a crackling backbeat, Miller pays tribute to predecessors like Charles Stepney and Richard Evans, the Chicago producer/arrangers who thrillingly blurred the lines between pop, soul, R&B, and jazz in their heyday.
As effectively as Miller keeps to the background, his electronically treated horn moves to the fore on “Plantasy,” featuring smeared-yet-sharp tones that bring to mind Jon Hassell. Miller doesn’t revel in texture for its own sake; the many layers and whinnying high register move in conjunction with piano and the gentle patter of electronic drums to create something dramatic and poignant. He switches between clean lead lines and small squelches on “Woah,” processing handclaps and percussion in a way that brings to mind TNT-era Tortoise, fusing electronics and instrumentation together in organic fashion.
Most of Resavoir is instrumental, but the tracks run at a concise pop length and the melodies are so catchy that when vocalists enter on the album’s last two tracks, it feels as if they’ve been there all along. Both songs neatly encapsulate the album’s dualities. On “Escalator,” a song about the perils of touring life, saxophonist/rapper Sen Morimoto swings between the quotidian (there are “no fucking cashews” at the gas station) to the cosmic (waking “on another planet with a different language”). And on “LML,” murmured affirmations from Mavis Staples and Noname collaborator Akenya Seymour suggest optimism, but the song’s backstory is darker: It was written in the wake of the Parkland shooting. Like the album itself, the song celebrates interconnectedness, embracing both hard life on the ground and the easy revery of the clouds above.
