French jazz-funk band Cortex makes sold-out Bay Area debut at UC Theatre
Heavily sampled '70s French jazz-funk group Cortex plays their first Bay Area concert ever when they headline a sold-out show at the UC Theatre in Berkeley Friday night.
The brainchild of noted hip-hop and soul producers Ali Shaheed Muhammad and Adrian Younge, Jazz Is Dead has set up the first full U.S. tour by Cortex this summer that features the band playing its influential album Troupeau Bleu in its entirety.
While they both had long successful careers prior to collaborating -- Muhammad as a member of iconic hip-hop act A Tribe Called Quest and super group Lucy Pearl, and multi-instrumentalist Younge for his production skills and film work -- the pair began a fruitful partnership that has included acclaimed soundtrack work for the Netflix show Luke Cage and recordings with their group the Midnight Hour for Younge's Linear Labs imprint. More recently, the pair launched its ambitious Jazz Is Dead project.
Initially focusing on live concerts with such heavily-sampled luminaries as Roy Ayers and Lonnie Liston Smith, Jazz Is Dead has also brought some of those '70s jazz influences and inspirations into the studio to record full albums, including such giants as Black Jazz recording artists Doug and Jean Carn, saxophonist Gary Bartz, longtime Gil Scott-Heron collaborator Brian Jackson and Brazilian masters Azymuth, Marco Valle and João Donato as well as like-minded younger musicians like Los Angeles group Katalyst. The group has also teamed with the UC Theatre to bring tours featuring such legendary players as Ethiopian jazz pioneer Mulatu Astatke and Brazilian greats Hermeto Pascoal and Arthur Verocai to the venue.
Pianist Alain Mion was raised in Paris and had established a musical career for himself by the late '60s, leading his own trio and playing with visiting American jazz musicians like Hank Mobley and Philly Joe Jones. It was in 1974 when Mion founded Cortex with drummer Alain Gandolfini. Recruiting session players and vocalist Mirelle Dalbray to fill out the group, Cortex recorded its remarkable debut album Troupeau Bleu in the space of two days. The recording's mix of psychedelic atmospheres, jazzy grooves built around Fender Rhodes electric piano, earthy funk and Brazilian samba achieved a special chemistry that would resonate with a future generation of hip-hop producers.
While Mion and Gandolfini would record several more albums with various collaborators, the band ran its course by 1981. It wouldn't be until decades later that Troupeau Bleu achieved its legendary status as an intoxicating secret weapon of rare groove DJs and later hip-hop producers. First sampled by DJ Cam on his experimental track "Bronx Theme" in 1997, the album would be used repeatedly in the 2000s and beyond by such notables as Dilla, MF Doom, Rick Ross, Tyler, the Creator, Flying Lotus, Lupe Fiasco and many others.
The sampling would revive interest in the group, leading Mion to put together a new line-up of the band in 2009 for performances in the UK and Europe as well as reissues of the original Cortex albums and previously unreleased material seeing the light of day. Jazz Is Dead first brought Cortex to the U.S. in 2022 to perform in New York, Los Angeles and at the Desert Daze Festival. Now 77 years old, Mion leads the latest version of his celebrated ensemble when it plays this sold-out show at the UC Theatre co-presented by KALW Friday night.
Jazz Is Dead Presents Cortex
Friday, July 12, 7 p.m. $32.50 (sold out)
UC Theatre