In These Times

It’s an album that creates and sustains its own unique atmosphere, there’s an admirable effort to avoid cliché, and everything is super hip. — Jazzwise, November 2022, 4 out of 5 stars More…

Release Date: 23rd Sep 2022
Catalogue No: XL1271LP
Label: XL Recordings

Jazzwise

Editor's Choice

November 2022
Presto Recordings of the Year

Finalist 2022
Stereogum

Best Jazz Albums of 2022

1. In These Times

2. The Fours

3. High Fives

4. Dream Another

5. Lullaby

6. This Place That Place

7. The Calling

8. Seventh String

9. So Ubuji

10. The Knew Untitled

11. The Title

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In These Times is a collection of polytemporal compositions inspired as much by broader cultural struggles as McCraven’s personal experience as a product of a multinational, working class musician community. With contributions from over a dozen musicians and creative partners from his tight-knit circle of collaborators – including Jeff Parker, Junius Paul, Brandee Younger, Joel Ross, and Marquis Hill – the music was recorded in five different studios and four live performance spaces while McCraven engaged in extensive post-production work at home. Featuring orchestral, large ensemble arrangements interwoven with the signature “organic beat music” sound that’s become his signature, the album is an evolution and a milestone for McCraven, the producer. But moreover, it’s the strongest and clearest statement we’ve yet to hear from McCraven, the composer.

Reviews

November 2022

It’s an album that creates and sustains its own unique atmosphere, there’s an admirable effort to avoid cliché, and everything is super hip.

November 2022

Seen as an integrated whole, though, In These Times establishes a holistic poetic sensibility tethered to McCraven’s genre-defying and rule-bending creative logic. It’s music ripe for a fragmented time in search of connections between the fragments.

In These Times

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In These Times

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