JILL SCOTT – TO WHOM THIS MAY CONCERN: REVIEW
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JILL SCOTT
To Whom This May Concern (The Orchard)
THE SCOURGE OF MODERN AUSTRALIA, John Howard, once said during his years in the political garbage bin that “the times will suit me” as he waited for selfishness, xenophobia and greed to come back in style. We didn’t need him, we didn’t really deserve him – well, not all of us – but we got him, that cultural dose of salts, and the stains have not been washed away yet.
At the other end of the cosmic righteous spectrum, as the cultural cleanser for the moral turpitude ruling right now, we do need Jill Scott, we deserve her – well, most of us – and the further you get into her new work in a decade, the more it is clear that the times suit her. Everywhere across her sixth album we see confirmed that these are the times for confidence in our better natures as much as resistance to the worst, for holding onto sensuality as much as history, for joy among the anger and community among egoism, and for education as a buffer to foolishness, not something to fear as we’re so often told it is.
In other words, To Whom This May Concern is a soul album for the soul.
A very filled soul, it should be noted. Firstly, while nothing goes long at all, there are 19 tracks getting the album towards 60 minutes, only one of them a sketch/interstitial/non-singing bit. And that track is Disclaimer advising “discretion is advised” because “if you get your shit shooked, I am not liable, responsible…”.
Secondly, the cast of supporting players is not small, from producers old and new like DJ Premier, Eric Wortham and Om'Mas Keith, to collaborators like brass king Trombone Shorty, soulful rapper Tierra Whack, and Ab-Soul, who more recently has paired with Doechii and Joey Bada$$. That is not a full list either.
And thirdly, To Whom This May Concern is a soul album in a broad sense. Scott reaches from gospel and liquid Luther Vandross grooves to rhythm and blues-meets-swing and Roberta Flack-ish jazz crossover, from nu-soul’s hip hop awareness and electro clubs to brass punches, super confident strings and moody nighttime drives. Her singing can be husky, agitated or wry, then turn from light and youthful to firm and decidedly mature, like she was – amazing I know – a full-spectrum woman not a Mar-a-Lago-faced mouthpiece.
The thrust of Be Great is a direct confrontation with a world (still) looking to diminish women, backing vocals turning their noses up, “I’m gonna go ahead and be great”, strings and bass pushing aside stragglers and brass and percussion dancing on their heads, and all the while Scott is striding through like that Beyonce filmclip where she’s smashing cars up with a baseball bat, except she isn’t angry, she’s just not accepting this shit.
But an immediate contrast is Beautiful People, where there’s a delicious Curtis Mayfield guitar-led rhythm intersecting with a full-face bass that pulls everything along almost nonchalantly, and while the voices in the background are smooth, Scott’s voice has just enough urgency to at first bring an edge and then a to-the-rafters surge.
The ‘90s R&B fluidity of Me 4 (over so quickly I keep checking the display at the end, because I know there’s more to be said here than the 95 seconds we get) and the languid slouch of The Math are surface deceivers as they still contain these edges lyrically and musically. Her more stylised spoken delivery in Ode To Nikki is met by Ab-Soul’s more heady manner, but in Dope Shit she has Maha Adachi Earth’s straightforwardness easily dominate squelchy early ‘70s synths.
So while armed government thugs rampage through the streets of Minneapolis and punch-happy police look to clear streets in Sydney, there isn’t yet a bar to saying no, that’s not how we roll. Jill Scott is exactly what we need.
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