The Epic (2015)
17 tracks, 173 minutes (3 CDs)
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More than half a century after Ornette Coleman released The Shape of Jazz to Come, the genre is still exciting, still evolving and still looking on into the future. Possibly the biggest star in jazz at the moment is Kamasi Washington, and his 2015 album The Epic is a musical statement as world-shaking as Ornette’s was – and hopefully as prescient.
And ‘Epic’ is correct: this is a rarely-seen triple album of almost three hours of music. It’s not just epic in its length either, this is a big album in every sense. The core band is already larger than most – trombone, trumpets, two keys players, two bassists, two drummers, a percussionist and Washington on the monolithic tenor sax. Then there’s guest vocalists and instrumentalists dotted around…and a 32-piece orchestra and a 20-piece choir. The themes – narratively, musically, politically – are similarly huge. There’s certainly a lot of listening in this one, but it’s definitely worth the time and effort dedicated to a close and concerted listen, even if it’s not always necessarily the easiest or most comfortable experience.
This album is a manifesto not only for Washington’s work, but for the whole of the new era of jazz. The very first track is ‘The Changing of the Guard’, the title of which is a self-assured statement of musical and artistic significance with only the slightest (and well-earned) arrogance that rivals that of Ornette’s 1959 album. And by the time the 12 minutes of that track are over, you’ll surely agree that the title is entirely warranted.
The notions of what jazz has to be make no constraints here. Even within the jazz realm Washington sees no boundaries. It’s why it’s so hard to describe The Epic in simple terms. It’s not bop, or hard-bop or post-bop, but it includes those things. It’s not big band, but that’s there’s too. Free jazz, spiritual jazz, jazz fusion, funk, soul, gospel, hip-hop, Afrofuturism, full-blown orchestral music á la Sketches of Spain – it’s none of these things because it is all of them. For me, the obvious comparisons in terms of composition are to Alice Coltrane and Sun Ra’s Arkestra, but (for me!) more defined than the former, and more refined than the latter. In terms of his playing, he has all of the greats inside him – Coltrane, Coleman, Sanders, Ayler, Parker even, to go back that far – but there’s also the energetic, powerful spark that all those musicians had that gave them something else, and Washington has it too.
And you know what’s incredible and exciting and a little terrifying? Aside from a couple of limited-run self-releases, this is Kamasi Washington’s debut. He spent a long time learning and earning his stripes, and obviously putting years of thought into his craft…and then marks his arrival as a bandleader with an explosion. Nothing is a half-measure; he knew his statement would take three hours to recite and so he took those three hours and it’s a marvel. There’s no point talking about every aspect of this album because it would take too long and he already says all he needs to say on the record. With this one album, Kamasi Washington has surely made sure his name is carved in marble among the pantheon of jazz greats, and he still has an entire career ahead of him. The Epic is an odyssey, and it’s only the start of this journey.
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