Rodger Fox Big Band Featuring King Kapisi: The Brotherman Project

If nothing—no matter how peculiar or aberrant—is undertaken without a reason, trombonist Rodger Fox, whose big band is the finest New Zealand has to offer, must have had his reasons for recording the band's newest album with the country's leading hip-hop artist, King Kapisi.

As jazz, like hip-hop, is an acquired taste, it is fruitless for someone who admires and appreciates one to impugn the other. It is what it is. And so we have King Kapisi rapping on every track, sometimes with help from band vocalist Erna Ferry (and perhaps some overdubbing; it's hard to tell), while the big band roars and resonates behind them.

As far as can be determined by one who is unfamiliar with the idiom, hip-hop lyrics, delivered in a staccato, machine-gun style drone, needn't rhyme as long as key words sound more or less alike, while the weighty and earnest chants—and cryptic song titles—imply an underlying and presumably portentous message. Any apppraisal would be more precise if said lyrics could be decoded. Perhaps if the album were replayed in slow motion...

It must be presumed, in the absence of proof to the contrary, and based on the honors and awards he has won in New Zealand, that King Kapisi is very good at what he does. But is he really a King? Well, as every song on the album was written or co-written by one Bill Urale, it's a pretty good bet that Kapisi was just plain Bill before he was crowned King. He does have an abundance of energy, and is able to rattle off lyrics at a pace approaching warp speed.

The band, to which rapid tempos are old hat, has no problem diving into Kapisi's music, and even manages to squeeze in an occasional solo, by Fox, tenors Oscar Laven or Adrian McCullough, alto Bryn van Vliet and guitarist Gus Reece. While the outcome is more than likely magisterial by hip-hop standards, there is no way it can be credibly appraised by a newcomer to the genre. So, three and one-half stars for the splendid Rodger Fox Big Band, and as many as are warranted from those to whom hip-hop is comprehensible.