Jimmy Edgar
XXX
!K7
After you’ve layered beats up on your turntable like a Viennese torte, it’s time to mix a little Atkins into your diet. Jimmy Edgar has been mixing for a few years, and on this collection of late-night dance music, he delivers some sophisticated tunes that show he’s gained some pared down perspectives on love, life, and the effect of music on them. His scratchy liner notes give up his lyrics, although you’ll have to study his doctor’s prescription style printing to see what they say. “Function of Love” opens with a chilled out vocal over incredibly plump bass beats. The promo company has a pick hit on this disc, “Hot, Raw Sex,” and it adds slender Blaxplotation beats and virtually no lyrics beyond the title. If you were making a retro porn flick, here’s the perfect soundtrack – sexy yet unobtrusive, and just about the right length to cover the time span between the doorbell ringing and the hot housewife giving him a tip.
Is there Auto-Tune? Yeah, I think it’s required by the Daft Punk/T-Pain Act of 2008, and in “Turn You Inside Out” Edgar uses it as well as anyone does these days. It takes the lyric and makes it sound spacey and electronic, which is trite but not inappropriate. As the collection grooves along, the mood turns darker and slower and by “Rewind, Stop the Tape,” there’s a late night jazz feel, although there’s no clarinet or drum kits. We begin to come down from the high orbits as the pace picks up on “Push” with its sweaty dirty dancing lyrics, but we never recover that burning energy of the first three tracks. Jimmy Edgar knows how to make music, and riding the roller coaster from soaring highs to spaced out chill isn’t bad, but I’d rather have more of his high energy work.
Jimmy Edgar: http://www.jimmyedgar.com
