John Carroll Kirby - Septet
An album that touches on the sublime...
The story of ‘Septet’ starts in late 2019.* John Carroll Kirby* performed at The Blue Whale in LA with a septet. The performance kicked his creative juices into gear. Then lockdown happened. To keep his mind active Kirby released the glorious ‘My Garden’ in April 2020. After that came ‘Conflict’, along with guest spots with Eddie Chacon and scoring the animated TV show ‘Cryptozoo’.
Now Kirby has returned to that night at The Blue Whale and released an ensemble piece, the fittingly titled ‘Septet’. This is everything we’ve come to expect from the man who has worked with Solange, Frank Ocean, Harry Styles, Connan Mockasin and Blood Orange. The album features Kirby on keyboards, Deantoni Parks on drums), Tracy Wannomae and Logan Horne on woodwinds, JP Maramba on bass, Nick Mancini mallets and David Leach on percussion.
Throughout ‘Septet’ Kirby delivers a wonderful mix of fun and bounce. ‘Jubilee Horns’ starts off with joyous horns and an understated bassline. The flutes are slightly hopeful, but with pangs of sadness. Much like the last year of lockdown. The main event is the wonderful false ending, then this stuttering outro kicks in that is really one of the defining moments on the album. The standout track is ‘Weep’. Despite the title it’s really uplifting, playful but also incredibly lyrical. There is a cathartic vibe going on, reminiscent of how after crying your feel better. In a nutshell it reminds me of Thundercat covering Herbie Hancock. The funky bounce is there, but so are these elegant melodies. They gently pull you in while the bass lines, and beats, glide around you.
The tracks aren’t just ethereal soundscapes, they are grounded in reality. ‘Rainmaker’ echoes the sound of a sprinkler, with its stuttering jets of water. ‘P64 By My Side’ is named after a puma that crosses freeways in Kirby’s hometown of LA and ‘Swallow Tail’ is simply about watching insects flying in the breeze from a window. Two years ago, Kirby might not have written songs about these things, but, like us all, during lockdown he was forced to refocus his gaze, and inspirations. This gives the album a sense of relatability. We’ve all idly looked out of a window and seen ants crawling, butterflies gliding and someone watering some plants. Most of us think nothing of them, other than an interval between zoom meetings or sad soups for lunch, but Kirby has turned them into exciting soundscapes. The way ‘Swallow Tail’ gently rises, and falls is sublime and the melodies that underpin this are exquisite. Listening to it I can almost see the butterflies.
What ‘Septet’ really does well is show how accomplished Kirby has become in his writing. The music is fun, with a joyous bounce, but also hints at a deep melancholy. It’s not sad, but it’s also not happy. Which, if we choose to admit it, is what the past 18 months have been. Personally, speaking there have been moments of sheer happiness but also some of the darkest I’ve ever known. All of this in in ‘Septet’. It truly is a product of its time, but instead of focusing on the negativity Kirby concentrates on those little moments that bring happiness. This is the takeaway from ‘Septet’, and one that we should all try and incorporate in our lives going forward.
*8/10*
Words: *Nick Roseblade *
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