Toronto-based jazz quartet BADBADNOTGOOD announced its upcoming new album, IV, during a show at the Spotify House in Austin, Texas. In town for the annual South by Southwest festival, the group - who just recently added a fourth member, tenor saxophonist Leland Whitty - jammed for 45 minutes and previewed several new songs that will feature on IV.
IV not only symbolizes the band’s fourth studio album (excluding last year’s collaborative Soul Sour with Wu Tang Clan’s Ghostface Killah), but alludes to the group’s official expansion to a four-piece. Whitty had previously featured on several tracks for BADBADNOTGOOD’s last two albums, BBNG2 and III. The saxophonist was in fine form at the Spotify House and even stood front and center on stage for the crowd in Austin.
Towards the end of the set, BBNG drummer Alex Sowinski informed the audience that the group would play a couple new songs. It’s unclear what the names of these tunes were, but they smoothly shifted back and forth between fast-paced tempos and groovy slow jams. It had the feel of classic jazz improvisation, and it remains to be seen if these songs will be recorded in the studio as so.
BADBADNOTGOOD has steadily raised its profile since forming in 2010 thanks to collaborations with popular artists. In addition to Ghostface Killah, BBNG has worked with hip-hop heavyweights Tyler, The Creator, Earl Sweatshirt, Danny Brown and Frank Ocean. The band also brilliantly reinterpreted Future Island’s well-known song, ‘Seasons (Waiting on You)’, which Future Island posted on its YouTube account. The cover has more than 460,000 hits at this time of writing.
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