Search - Various Artists :: Def Jazz

Very Impressed

R. Tell | 12/23/2005

(5 out of 5 stars)

"I had heard the Hey Young World song on a jazz station and absolutely loved it. I never imagined that the entire CD would be as good. I could listen to this CD over and over again. If you are in to hip hop, rap and all that, THIS IS NOT the CD for you. But if you like old school songs with a twist of jazz acoustics, you will love this. I recommend it to anyone, it just depends on your taste in music."

Definitely get this album!

Soldier77 | Laurel, MD USA | 01/20/2006

(4 out of 5 stars)

"If you grew up in the times of old school hip hop onward, you will recognize all the tracks on this album. The best cut by far is Slick Rick's "Hey Young World," but every song is good. I gave it four stars because while it's very good, it's not perfect.



I say not perfect because with all the big jazz names on the album(Roy Hargrove, Gerald Albright, Hubert Laws and Rick Braun to name a few), their appearances in the album alone sets the expectation bar pretty high. Although they all did a great job, it wasn't the absolute best work they could put, therefore it was perhaps two or three steps away from being perfect.



The horn arrangement on Jay-Z's "Can I Get A..." struggled to match the energy that the original track is known for. On Method Man's "Bring The Pain," I was looking forward hearing the original beat, but they changed it up some to the point where I couldn't audibly recognize it until the vocals came in. Also, since Rick Braun was on there it would have been good to have Kirk Whalum somewhere on the album too. But that's really the only major flaws I found in the album. "Hey Young World" was perfectly done, even had a go-go/reggae feel to it. "All I Need" was excellent, and they go WAAAAAAYYY back with Oran Juice Jones' "The Rain. It's a really good album. Not perfection, but definitely not a waste of money."

Def Jazz

P. Corrighan | Maidenhead, Berkshire, England | 09/16/2005

(5 out of 5 stars)

"An excellent, feel good album with a varied mix of smooth jazz artists with the Def jam/rap flavour. I particularly liked the great playing of Jeff Lorber on the vibes on "Can I get A..", the best I have heard him play in a long time. I had not heard of Dwight Stills but he plays a mean guitar and on the track "Doin' it" his playing blends in really well with the vocal arrangements. The arrangements are fresh and different e.g.in smooth jazz you rarely hear the flute but it works well on the track "Bring back the pain". The organ playing of Joey DeFrancesco is exihilrating. A highlight of the album is "The Rain" with powerful vocals by Ledisi and driving drums/percussion and an interesting rap, a strange mixture but it really works. So go out and buy it and have a blast."