by Niko Skinner

The Comet Is Coming is a jazz-rock band based out of London. You will typically hear elements of jazz, electronica, funk, and psychedelic rock out of this band. The Comet Is Coming especially stands out because jazz is usually associated with different parts of the U.S. (ex. New Orleans, Chicago, New York City, etc.) nowadays. However, British jazz blew up in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s with the arrival of musicians such as Harry Beckett, John Taylor, and Michael Gibbs coming into the limelight to forge their own sound and diversify jazz music. This explosion did not last for a very long time, and British jazz had all but fizzled out by the late 1980s (Waring). Since their arrival in 2013, The Comet Is Coming has played a big part in bringing elements of British jazz back into the scene.

Toward the end of September, The Comet Is Coming released an album titled Hyper-Dimensional Expansion Beam. There is plenty of room for observation when it comes to this album. On a side note, I like how the title sounds like the name of a move from the Dragon Ball series. I also have to say that this album as well as their music in general has such a hypnotic effect. This makes sense if you take into account the combination of different genres being used. Something that jumped off the page for me was the consistent use of saxophones. The saxophone riffs you hear throughout the album are played at a quick tempo and steady rhythm. There is a good amount of long tones mixed in as well. Songs such as “ATOMIC WAVE DANCE”, “ANGEL OF DARKNESS”, and “TECHNICOLOUR” consist of percussion that is played in the same swing rhythm that you would typically hear in jazz music. I think all of this is what mainly drives the jazz sound in the album. I also liked the way that all of the elements from various styles are being manipulated. A strong example would be the instrumentation pattern heard in “CODE”, which consists of the use of call-and-response between the saxophone and synthesizer sounds. To explain it in depth, you hear a constant back-and-forth switch between the synthesizer and saxophone, so you get both jazz and electronica vibes from this song. There is also a lot of dissonance throughout Hyper-Dimensional Expansion Beam as you would expect to hear in psychedelic rock music. This means that there are a lot of phrases played throughout that sound tense and jarring. This is uniquely mixed with some funk and jazz grooves that you can dance to. The Comet Is Coming did a good job at making these conflicting elements work together.

To be honest, this band’s music presented quite the challenge for me to uncover because there is a lot to analyze. I went back and listened to songs that fall in to the category of one genre and compared them to the songs in Hyper-Dimensional Expansion Beam. This is good practice because it stimulates the brain and makes listening to the album more intentional. The Comet Is Coming is certainly not a group that likes to put all of their eggs in one basket.

References

Bua, Jane. “The Comet Is Coming Announce Album, Share New Song “Code”: Listen”. Pitchfork.com, 29 July 2022. https://pitchfork.com/news/the-comet-is-coming-announce-new-album-share-new-song-code-listen/

Waring, C. (2021, August 18). The British Jazz Explosion Of The Late 60s And Early 70s. UDiscoverMusic. https://www.udiscovermusic.com/stories/british-jazz-explosion-60s-70s-feature/