Jaimie Branch: Fly Or Die Fly Or Die Fly Or Die ((World War))

As the malign forces of Amerikkka gather for their 2024 assault on truth, justice and democracy, an assault from which, if it is successful, there may be no peaceable reversal available four years down the line, the American jazz world should hang its head in shame. Denunciations of and opposition to the rise of domestic neo-fascism have been mostly confined to rock and hip hop. In jazz, with some noble exceptions, it has been business as usual. Now, in autumn 2023, before it is too late, assuming it is not already too late, American jazz needs to lift its voice and shout.

To anyone who questions the right of a Londoner to say this, the answer is, as it has been for almost one hundred years, that when America sneezes, the world catches a cold. And a Londoner might, at the risk of sounding smug, further point out that much of their city's jazz scene has been loudly on the side of progressive politics since the late 2010s.

Two of the noble exceptions to American jazz's political nonengagement have been Irreversible Entanglements and trumpeter Jaimie Branch, both of them recording for Chicago's International Anthem label (which has strong links with the London scene). Both artists have used vocals: Irreversible Entanglements with the performance poetry of Moor Mother, Branch with her own use of half-sung, half-declaimed refrains. Vocals make the job easier, of course, but attitude has to come first. And vocals are not a prerequisite of protest/resistance music. Given the necessary attitude, a clear message can also be communicated through stage presentation, media presence, album covers, festivals, club nights, press releases, radio programmes and a raft of extra-musical activities.

Fly Or Die Fly Or Die Fly Or Die ((World War)) is Branch's third studio album. Tragically, it is also a posthumous release. Branch died from an accidental drug overdose at her home in Brooklyn in August 2022. She was just 39 years old. By then the album, which had been tracked at the Bemis Center for Contemporary Arts in Omaha in April 2022, and overdubbed and mixed in Chicago three months later, was near complete, with only tweaks, final titles and artwork to be finalized. In the months following Branch's passing, her family and band members—cellist Lester St. Louis, bassist Jason Ajeman, drummer Chad Taylor—got together to finish the record.

The result is the most beautiful new jazz album to be released so far in 2023. It explodes with great music and love and passion and freedom and joy. It is exactly what the doctor ordered. It will make the lame walk and the stooped stand straight. One could talk about St. Louis' amphetamine-urgent high-register viola-like cello passages evoking the Velvet Underground in its John Cale pomp, or the Death In The Afternoon majesty of Branch's open trumpet, or the shades of La Monte Young's opium-addled drone music... but the best way to feel the spirit of Fly Or Die Fly Or Die Fly Or Die ((World War)) is to play the YouTube clip below (note: the track is not indicative of the album's overall vocals to instrumental ratio; only one other track is so vocals-centric and others are purely instrumental).

In their liner notes, St. Louis, Ajeman and Taylor write: "For this [album], jaimie wanted to play with longer forms, more modulations, more noise, more singing, and as always, grooves and melodies... jaimie wanted this album to be lush, grand and full of life, just as she was." It is indeed all of those things.

Postscript: Now Branch is no longer with us, and Irreversible Entanglements has moved to Impulse!, the question for International Anthem is, what comes next? Given the label's track record, it should be worth waiting for the answer.

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