Where I'm Meant to Be

by Ezra Collective

Overview

Ezra Collective won well-deserved critical and commercial acclaim for 2019's You Can't Steal My Joy, a raucous debut long-player laced with elements of Afrobeat, jazz, hip-hop, and grime. However, before they could take it on tour globally, the COVID-19 pandemic set in. They introduce the same musical chemistry on Where I'm Meant to Be and still employ massive doses of jazz-funk layered inside swinging Afrobeat, salsa, grime, and soul. On "Life Goes On" (featuring Sampa the Great), party sounds meet James Mollison's honking tenor sax, Femi Koleoso's funky beats, and Sampa's rapid-fire delivery as T.J. Koleoso's insistent bassline and Ife Ogunjobi's trumpet solo above Joe Armon-Jones' organ and piano vamps before massive funk arrives with a trumpet solo to carry it out. "Victory Dance" commences as a triple-timed drum and percussion orgy atop shouted human voices. Afro-Cuban-styled horns and hand percussion bump and burn before the horns usher in an Afro-Cuban theme. Armon-Jones enters, then takes off with rapid montunos as the tune moves to intense salsa with soaring trumpet. They don't let up when Kojey Radical fronts the band on the single "No Confusion." Anchored by T.J.'s circular funk bassline, the horns pulse in driving Afrobeat style above Femi's breaking snares and hi-hat while Armon-Jones lays down sinister chord voicings, adding to the rhythm section's heft as Radical syncopates his incendiary delivery. "Welcome to My World" is all groove and grit as post-bop and Afrobeat horns meet dubwise rhythms in a strutting frenzy. "Ego Killah" is strictly dubwise steaminess with double-time bass and piano vamps; interlocking drums and percussion rub against and buoy one another. That track is followed by the R&B-centric "Smile" led by Armon-Jones' crystalline jazz piano harmonies supported by a rhythm section playing smooth, gentle, neo-'80s soul. "Live Strong" inserts grooving '70s-styled funk into shimmering contemporary jazz piano and swinging horns. Emeli Sande assists on the livelier sounding "Siesta," offering her heavenly yet assertive soprano atop Rhodes piano, congas, bongos, and bass. "Belonging" arrives as interstellar space jazz with glorious soloing from Mollison and martial snare from Koleoso. Armon-Jones opens a harmonic door in the bridge as the tune begins to assert itself, wedding spacious spiritual jazz to driving neo-electro and funk. His knotty acoustic piano solos with both Koleosos in trio. The set closes with a reading of Sun Ra's "Love in Outer Space" as a finger-popping, smooth, jazzy, neo-soul jam with Nao (Neo Jessica Jones) emoting in her wispy, reedy soprano as T.J. Koleoso guides her with a slippery, resonant bassline framed by ascendant horns and spectral keys. While Where I'm Meant to Be is a logical follow-up to Ezra Collective's debut, it's a soulful, musically advanced, rhythmically infectious one, too. ~ Thom Jurek

Product Details

Release Date:	11/04/2022
Label:	Partisan
UPC:	0720841302025

Tracks

1. Life Goes On
2. Victory Dance
3. No Confusion
4. Welcome to My World
5. Togetherness
6. Ego Killah
7. Smile
8. Live Strong
9. Siesta
10. Words by Steve
11. Belonging
12. Never the Same Again
13. Words by TJ
14. Love in Outer Space

Album Credits

Performance Credits

Ezra Collective   Primary Artist
Stella Page   Viola
Wayne Urquhart   Cello
Antonia Pagulatos   Violin
Chris Tyler   Clapping
Joe Armon-Jones   Clapping,Keyboards
Emeli Sande   Vocals,Featured Artist
Steve McQueen   Vocals
Nao   Vocals,Featured Artist
Teni Tinks   Vocals,Vocals (Background)
Louise LaBelle   Vocals,Vocals (Background)
Junior Alli-Balogun   Percussion
Luke Farnell   Clapping
Benjamin Totten   Guitar
Femi Koleoso   Drums,Vocals,Clapping
James Mollison   Clapping,Saxophone
Ife Ogunjobi   Trumpet,Clapping
Toyosi Jonathan Koleoso   Vocals,Clapping,Guitar (Bass)
Mark Mollison   Guitar
Tobi Adenaike-Johnson   Guitar
Petra Luke   Vocals,Vocals (Background)
Angel Silvera   Vocals,Vocals (Background)
Athalie Armon-Jones   Violin
Oluwatobi Adenaike-Johnson   Guitar
Clint Dawson   Clapping
Ivy Dawson   Clapping
Sam Kennedy   Violin
Riccardo Damian   Clapping
Amy Frenchum   Clapping
Sampa the Great   Vocals,Featured Artist
Jorja Smith   Vocals
Kojey Radical   Vocals,Featured Artist

Technical Credits

Fela Kuti   Composer
John Turner   Composer
Charlie Chaplin   Composer
Tony Allen   Composer
Sun Ra   Composer
Stuart Hawkes   Mastering
Neil Waters   String Arrangements
Joe Armon-Jones   Composer,Group Member
Emeli Sande   Composer
Steve McQueen   Composer
Kwadwo Adu Genfi Amponsah   Composer
Luke Farnell   Assistant Engineer
Ezra Collective   Producer,Liner Notes
Femi Koleoso   Group Member
James Mollison   Composer,Group Member
Ife Ogunjobi   Composer,Group Member
Toyosi Jonathan Koleoso   Composer,Programming,Group Member
Eric Lau   Mixing
Jess Camilleri   Engineer
Tris Ellis   Engineer
Olufemi David Koleoso   Composer
Geoffrey Parsons   Composer
Riccardo Damian   Engineer,Producer,Additional Production
Sampa Tembo   Composer