Ryan Mastro photo
Galactic plays the Commodore Ballroom on Thursday Oct. 18.
Despite The number of musicians orbiting Galactic, the jazz-funk collective manages to stick together.
When the band unveiled its new lineup at the Bonnaroo festival last summer, the situation could have backfired. Seven of the MCs featured on From The Corner To The Block joined Galactic’s six members onstage for the first time.
“It actually felt really natural,” said bassist Robert Mercurio. “Going in, we were worried it would be disjointed, especially since we used blended vocalists on a few songs, but it turned out just like we wanted.”
That on-stage coherence filters to the band’s new album. Listening, one notices a well-matched blend between MC cadence and the band’s instruments. Though formed in 1994 as a primarily instrumental band, (with a long-time vocalist who’s since left), Galactic’s new album signaled a change of direction for the New Orleans-based sextet.
“We’ve been influenced a lot by hip hop and its beats and grooves,” said Mercurio.
“Hip-hop producers look for the same things we do.”
Asked how a well-respected band dealt with the bias in hip hop — that the audience’s eyes and ears are often rooted on the MC — Mercurio said it wasn’t a problem. It may help that many of the MCs on the album (Boots Riley and Lyrics Born spring to mind) often rap over live instruments. Juvenile, the MC most inclined to stick to samples, has a long-time friendship with the group, who backed him during a performance on Jimmy Kimmel live.
Given the rift between some hip-hop fans between sample-based backing and live instruments, Galactic’s choices seem solid, though Mercurio said that wasn’t the main criteria when picking collaborators.
“The main criteria … was that we didn’t want to get into the bling-bling,” he said. “We wanted more conscious MCs.”
