Jim James
Eternally Even

LA RECENSIONE

Deus ex machina of My Morning Jacket, Jim James releases this album in the fall of 2016, his second solo effort after the strong debut "Regions of Light and Sound of God" (ATO Records 2013).

What's inside? More hip hop than rock, more soul than psychedelia. Or perhaps exactly the opposite?

Never banal sounds for dynamic songs, consciously relaxed, where distorted guitars are brilliantly balanced with organs and old keyboards. An album of those that are no longer made, yet at the same time tremendously modern.

An album polleggione someone would say. Because in the single “Same Old Lie” James becomes the king of polleggioni. As we should all be at least once in a lifetime.

The old dear psychedelia emerges in the long instrumental “We Ain’t Getting Any Younger Pt. 1,” perhaps the only track where you can really glimpse his main band.

The final trumpet of “In the Moment” takes you far away in your mind while you’re having a last drink, there, at the usual place. The always fabulously imperfect voice manages to tell you about the pains you secretly carry in your soul.

The typically R&B rhythms lighten a listening experience that could seem intricate if you're lazily dragging yourself from the couch to the fridge on a sultry summer afternoon. And that drive keeps you hooked until the end, despite the exquisite arrangements.

A top-of-the-class album that, as always, goes unnoticed. Too little cool compared to the more popular Bon Iver, Frank Ocean, and Anderson Paak.

The lyrics are subtly political but without becoming too didactic, as it is precisely in these areas that Jim James's style excels, jamming between spontaneity and mystical visions.

Without calling that pig Trump a pig, in short.

We flew high that autumn, with eyes already set on the future but with solid foundations behind. Ready to face what was soon to happen.

Marvin Gaye remained listening.