On I THINK I’M GOOD, the second full-length from Seattle-raised, Brooklyn-based drummer and composer, Kassa Overall, the fast-rising musician masterfully dissolves the barriers between hip hop and jazz music. Taking cues from Karriem Riggins, Madlib and Flying Lotus, Overall matches jazz improvisation with beatmaker ingenuity. He’s ambitious as much as he is accomplished, dicing with serious subject matter as he leaps between the record’s soulful, kaleidoscope trip of ideas.
The record features a cadre of New York’s brightest up and comers,
including Joel Ross and Morgan Guerin, as well as some of its big hitters, such
as Brandee Younger and Theo Croker. It even features an especially recorded
cameo from legendary activist and author
Dr. Angela Davis.
It’s an album that speaks to the contemporary state of America. Overall
wrestles with the abhorrent American prison system, the ebbs and flows of
romantic relationships, and his experiences of grappling with mental health and
hospitalisation. I THINK I’M GOOD conveys
a singular feeling of intimacy, a byproduct of Overall’s indie hustle and
uncanny at-home and on-the-fly production methods. It’s the perfect vehicle
for Overall’s delicate meditations, weighing up emotions of despair, but
never drowning out the feeling of a fragile but
vital hope.