Slauson Malone

The former Standing on the Corner member has created a record where the music appears by and large as brutally cut vignettes rather than fully formed tracks, like hurriedly bounced sketches of material forming the genesis of an idea. On 'A Quite Farewell', featured performers (and Marsalis' own voice) form part of the surroundings rather than any form of anchor point, appearing at random points throughout the record and treated no different to any of the other instruments and samples. At one point a whole verse is muddied to the point of being inaudible under the beat, as if recorded from behind a wall. This is the beauty of this record, where the fun is in hearing how Marsalis toys with his material and the listener. Brief passages of isolated, time stretched and wordless vocals or ambient buzz or just complete silence will whiplash into something fully formed and vice versa, with sense of place and time jarringly restored or broken. In a cheap sense, this could be understood as a Death Grips era Donuts, but really the listening experience can be likened to anything from Endtroducing, to Disintegration Loops to vines or a youtubehaiku playlist.