147: Gilles Peterson | Kassa Overall

Gilles Peterson is one of the most influential DJs and music curators in the world. Throughout his career, Peterson has played a pivotal role in promoting genres such as jazz, hip-hop, and electronic music. He has founded influential labels such as Acid Jazz and Talkin' Loud, and started his current label, Brownswood Recordings, in 2006. Whether as a broadcaster, live DJ, record producer, festival organizer, or music curator, Peterson has devoted his life to finding, contextualizing, and presenting the music he loves from around the world. He sees his job as “connecting the dots.”

Since 2009, we have been on a journey with Gilles Peterson and Brownswood Recordings to reveal the best of Cuba's contemporary music scene - navigating from hip hop to jazz, from electronic to rumba. These eight years of passionate musical research are now condensed into one compilation, out on November 18th.

www.havana-cultura.com Discover Gilles Peterson interview, photos, clips, and articles on havana-cultura.com

Set to coincide with the opening ceremony of Brazil’s 2016 Olympics, Gilles Peterson’s feature-length documentary on Brazilian music is now available to watch online for the first time. Titled Brasil Bam Bam Bam, it was filmed in 2014 to then tour film festivals and one-off screenings without ever being available to a wider audience. Filmed during the making of the debut Sonzeira album of the same name, the record was a unique collision of Brazilian’s brightest musical lights. Likewise, the film is about giving a snapshot of contemporary Brazilian music that goes deeper than the bossa nova stereotypes. Heading out there with Sam Shepherd (aka Floating Points) and Rob G (aka Earl Zinger of Galliano and 2 Banks of 4), they met touchstones from different corners of Brazil’s musical universe: moving from Ed Motta’s record collection to performances by superstar Elza Soares, they also visit Rio’s infamous favelas. Touching on the police pacification in preparation for 2014’s World Cup and this year’s Olympics, they see the birthplace of samba in light of its subversive, outlawed history. And of course, there’s the hunt for records too. In particular, Gilles’ search for José Prates’ Tam… Tam… Tam… !, which turned out to be the inspiration – and source material – for the new Sonzeira album, Tam Tam Tam Reimagined, released on his Brownswood Recordings last month. Poring through record shops around Rio, it’s another insight into the breadth of styles and sounds out there. The film was produced by BOSH, the award winning, in-house production arm of ad agency Mother London. Their resident director Charlie Inman teamed up with Rio de Janeiro-based director Ben Holman, of Beija Films.

One of Peterson’s most recent discoveries, Kassa Overall is, in the words of Time Out New York, “a Renaissance man: part chopsy, super-funky jazz drummer, and part rising producer-MC.” Since the January 2019 release of his critically acclaimed debut album Go Get Ice Cream and Listen to Jazz, NYC and global audiences have had the opportunity to experience Overall’s unique blend of jazz, hip hop, electronic and spoken word.

Buy / Stream: https://kassaoverall.lnk.to/IKYSM https://twitter.com/KassaOverall https://www.instagram.com/kassaoverall/ https://www.facebook.com/kassaoverallofficial/ 'I Know You See Me' is the first offering on Brownswood for Kassa Overall. One of the fastest rising stars of NYC's legendary jazz scene and a self-described "backpack jazz" artist, he melds the praxis of avant-garde improvisation with hip-hop production techniques.

Kassa and I first spoke in 2019 and this conversation is a bit of a reunion. His forthcoming release, I Think I’m Good, will be released on Brownswood Recordings. The first single “I Know You See Me” is out now.

I spoke to both Gilles and Kassa at the 2020 NY Winter Jazzfest.