Grade: 85/100
The new album by Flying Lotus, “You’re Dead!”, is a tour de force of mastermind Steven Ellison’s jazz and electronic musical prowess.
Ellison is the great nephew of late jazz pianist Alice Coltrane and her husband, saxophonist John Coltrane.
The album begins with a song called “Theme,” which introduces the immense musical masses of sound that move through the album, but also the flying jazz mini-solos Flying Lotus is known for.
As the title suggests, “You’re Dead!” has a strong theme of death, and the album’s lyrics continually treat death and dying in a humourous way.
As a matter of fact, the full title of the album, as listed on Flying Lotus’s website, is “You’re Dead!: A Psychedelic Death Trip.”
However, the album is much more prone to toe-tapping than other psychedelic music. Musical structures and beats often break down and change rapidly, but there are definite sections of many songs that were made for dancing.
But “You’re Dead!” isn’t just an electronic album.
Almost all of Flying Lotus’ material is driven by post-bop jazz. The second track, “Tesla” features renowned jazz pianist Herbie Hancock. However, the jazz sound on “You’re Dead!” is constantly absorbed and recreated by Ellison’s fascination and familiarity with hip-hop and electronica.
The album features plenty of popular hip-hop artists, such as Kendrick Lamar, Snoop Dogg and FKA Twigs. Ellison also raps on multiple tracks under the name “Captain Murphy.”
Other guest artists played an important part in minute parts of the album, like the random mumblings of Earl Sweatshirt on the song, “Dead Man’s Tetris.”
Captain Murphy’s rapping style is technically and lyrically excellent, but it also has this layer of palatability provided by the fact that the same person who is rapping is also making all of the music he’s rapping over. Fans will likely be impressed by how much Captain Murphy appears on this album.
The album’s third track, “Cold Dead” is the perfect example of the unwillingness to stay steady in any sense. The song has an avant-garde jazz drive with prog-metal guitar and saxophone runs reminiscent of Ellison’s great-uncle John.
But more than being an “electronic album” or a “jazz album” or even a “trip-hop album”, “You’re Dead!” proposes an innovative sound, a style created by Ellison that others will undoubtedly attempt to replicate and expound upon in the near future.