New Memphis Colorways’ agglomeration of sounds on It Is What It Isn’t combines funk and Afrobeat with strains of progressive rock and jamband loopiness – and that’s all within the first three minutes.
It’s all attributable to the mind (and fingers) of Paul Taylor. The multi-instrumentalist mixes those aforementioned styles with jazz, blues, electronica and old-school soul and pure hokeyness into a dazzling blend of – well, psychedelic groove music comes as close as anything else to defining it.
Taylor’s work on guitar, bass (fretted and fretless), synthesizers, drums and percussion, even the occasionally jokey omnichord, brings to mind Weather Report one minute, Snarky Puppy the next, then – unfortunately – those jokey synthesizer recordings from the ’60s and ’70s. That lattermost would be the case on the heavily vocoderized version of “All the Things You Are.” It’s interesting, perhaps, but hardly necessary.
Taylor, ummm, New Memphis Colorways fares much better on the similarly bizarre cover of Jaco Pastorius’ “Teen Town.” Here the bent notes and space effects serve the song well. When he gets into the bridge he adds the funk to the proceedings, then some serious guitar licks, before doing the same on bass.
The originals aren’t all that different – grooving one minute, before Taylor gives in to the temptation to show how outré he can get. That would be “Ffs, Tmi.” “On the Downs” features a killer groove on guitar, at least until the effects (synthesizer? Omnichord?) take over. “Stanlee’s Sonata” is the best tune on the recording, likely because Taylor mostly plays it straight.
Which obviously is not what Taylor is going for as New Memphis Colorways. So take this recording for what it is. Or isn’t.
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