Exactly. More people need to start speeding up the tempo, throwing down with the drums and the bass, and get music back where it should be and should have never left.....the dance floor.

First 2 albums!!I never got into the later ones.
/peace Manki

Is A Funk Odyssey that good? Right now, A Funk Odyssey and Traveling Without Moving are getting most of my attention.

My chronological playlist:

"When You Gonna Learn"
"Too Young To Die"
"Return Of the Space Cowboy"
"Stillness In Time"
"Manifest Destiny"
"Morning Glory"
"Virtual Insanity"
"Everyday"
"Alright"
"Bonus Track (Do You Know Where You're Coming From"
"Canned Heat"
"Butterfly"
"Little L"
"Main Vein"
"Picture Of My Life"
"Seven Days In Sunny June"

silverchild said:

"AFO" is not their best album nor is it my favorite (the answer to both would be "TROTSC") but, coincidentally, it has become my most listened-to album. The disco-pop songs on the album are irresistible to me, as I love that type of music, and were clearly created to be catchy and hit-worthy. I can see why this album is getting most of your attention: "AFO" is by far their most accessible and most commercial work. Those songs I'm attracted to include:

"Feel So Good"
"YGMS" (The only song that even gets remotely close to the word "classic" on this album is this song. It's one of my favorite songs of their career, actually. That bassline? )
"Love Foolosophy" (...even though it's one of the biggest creative sellouts of their career..."LF" barely sounds like classic-Jamiroquai)
"Main Vein"
-not-"Little L"

The 2nd half, however, is loaded with the some work they've ever done ("Twenty Zero One", "Picture Of My Life" and, especially, "Black Crow"). The split between random, weed-influenced folk music and synth-heavy disco, to say the least, doesn't work.

Bottom line: "AFO" is not 'funky' and it's very inconsistent but just as long as you take it for what it is (a digestible, non-groundbreaking detour for the band) and don't necessarily call it a classic, it's all good.

BTW...who has the "AFO" test pressing? I do!

About "TWM": This album had to definitely grow on me. They lost a lot of their jazz edge with this album and I had a problem with that when I was first getting into Jamiroquai. I like it a lot now but I'll take "TROTSC" over it.

oh and silverchild...listen to "The Return Of The Space Cowboy" over and over again until you get it. You will be very, very glad you did.

And I'm prepared for battle when I say this but I HATE "Synkronized" and I think it's the most soulless, melody-less and musically uninteresting collection of work in their entire collection. I was SO disappointed. They sound like a wannabe-version of themselves on this album, to be honest (and I can understand why considering their loss) and it is a far last.

Top-tier Jamiroquai, to me, is:
"When You Gonna Learn (Digeridoo)"
"Too Young To Die"
"Blow Your Mind"
"Space Cowboy"
"Stillness In Time" <--- My 2nd Favorite Jamiroquai Song...a very, very close second...
"Half The Man"
"Manifest Destiny" <--- My Favorite Jamiroquai Song. Absolute.Perfection.
"Morning Glory"
"Virtual Insanity"
"Cosmic Girl"
"Everyday"
"Spend A Lifetime"
"Do You Know Where You're Coming From"
"You Give Me Something"
"Dynamite"
"Seven Days In Sunny June"
"Starchild"

Honorable Mentions:
"Use The Force"
"Butterfly" <--- The only redeemable song on "Synkronized", and even it gets tiring
"Feel So Good"
"Love Foolosophy"

soul4thought said:

I just brought the TWM album from Amazon.com and I think I am going to check out the TROTSC album next. In fact, I'm going to check out some of the cuts from the TROTSC album on my Napster playlist shortly.

muse87 said:

oh my GOD!!!

I havethe feeling I've heard this
but I hav ethe feeling I haven't

this is crazy!!!

I remember owning this one:

as a youth

aalloca said:

I thought I was the only one who noticed this The 'Space Cowboy' album has a muffled sound! It sounds like it wasn't mixed properly.It seriously needs to be remastered,to make it sound clearer.

vainandy said:

This is why I love Jamiroquai.They're making music the "old school way"....with real,funky basslines....fast,relentless beats....catchy hooks....and NO hip-hop elements.Jamiroquai understands the importance of a good groove.They're like a modern-day Chic.

Damn right. It's damn rediculous that people don't have the good taste to throwdown any more and make something to shake the asses rather than something to bob the heads. Jamiroquai definately delivers in the jams to shake the asses and if I want to see a head bob, I'll get somebody to suck my dick. Other than that, music should be made for the ass, not the head.

SoulAlive said:

Fair, but they incorporated elements of electronica/dance into their later work.

namepeace said:

True.'A Funk Odyssey' uses eletronica elements to embellish the music while still keeping it funky and late-70s sounding.I like the way they do that.

SoulAlive said:

This is getting from bad to worse.

First two album: 70's soul/funk
Third album: major swift towards dance, modern discohouse
From the fourth album on: Songbased modern uninspired filter discohouse. Sometimes funky, nothing 70's sounding, nothing retro about it.

It's the same thing when I look at some myspace/community sites. They list those house dj's (nothing wrong with them, sometimes I like me some clubhouse) in the genre funk. The term funk is highly devalued.

Sander said:

"Nothing 70s sounding"?? "Canned Heat" sounds like it's straight from 1978! That's pure disco.You can't get no more retro-sounding than that Subsequent songs like "Little L","You Give Me Something","Soul Education","Starchild","Dynamite" and even "Sunny Days In Sunny June" are all retro-sounding.

SoulAlive said:

The last few albums by Jamiroquai are current. They sound like a lot of the stuff you hear nowadays, which is labelled as clubhouse, or discohouse. You know about Hedkandi? Or even 'Don't stop the music' by Rihanna? You call that retro too? I call it current.

Don't get me wrong, I can still enjoy the fun that is Jamiroquai. It just isn't 70's sounding anymore. It sounds like 2005. Listen to the first two albums, Amy, Sharon Jones, Nicole Willis, even Quantic SO or Duffy. That's the 60's/70's sound.

Perhaps you can call it funky, but it sure ain't funk.

Sander said:

I completely disagree.In fact,one of the reasons why I love their recent work is because of the retro sounds.Yes,there are a few "modern" elements throughtout,but when I listen to a song like "Starchild","Runaway" or "Time Won't Wait",I don't think of the present day.Those songs take me right back to the late 70s disco era.The latter song sounds like a lost-lost outtake from Michael Jackson's 'Off The Wall'.Jamiroquai makes music as if we never got past 1979,lol.They use an "Old School approach" to making music.There is nothing current about a song like "Canned Heat".Even "Seven Days In Sunny June" sounds like a Roy Ayers groove from the late 70s (and for good reason....Roy Ayer's bassplayer is playing the bass on this song).



Again,I'm gonna have to disagree with you I think Jamiroquai sounds way more "retro" than almost anyone else right now.Their music captures everything that I love about 70s funk/R&B/disco.



Whatever

Sander said:

I agree with the last sentence. The J may be an R&B outfit, but not a funk outfit.

I completely agree with you that EOPE and ROTSC featured a more "organic" R&B/disco sound. That's what was so appealing and entertaining about them. IHMO, Zender's departure forced a change in their sound, he was irreplaceable for their purposes.

TWM was the ideal groove for them insofar as fusing old and new. You look at songs like "Virtual Insanity," "Everyday" and "Alright" and you notice a maturation, where they are creating unique songs in the old school mode. But then you hear the "Bonus Track" (my favorite post-ROTSC track) and it's on that electronica/dance tip, and like the best house songs, still groovy.

After TWM I honestly believe that we're running into diminishing returns. But there are still some nice tracks with an old-school groove at the heart of them, like "Canned Heat," "Little L" and 'Dynamite." But the electronica sound started to become more prevalent. There are some other songs that just don't work for me on those albums.

SoulAlive said:

Today I played some Jamiroquai. Canned heat was one of the tracks you mentioned and it actually did sound very old-school disco to me. I'll give you that! It was one of the few tracks to be so blatantly 70's disco. Most tracks however did have a very nu-feel to them.

That brings us to the term retro. I guess I use retro when something is recreated in the same style. So, Ginuwine covering 'when doves cry' isn't retro, or Dr Dre using 'P-funk' isn't retro. They're REcreating to make it something else, something current, something that could have only been made in that small timespan. Perhaps retro can also be used in the way to describe something that has a likeness to something of the past.

In the seventies you had a lot of great funk-bands. At the end of the decade a lot of them were trying to survive by churning out disco, watered down uninspired dance-fodder. It is kinda ironic that it seems like Jamiroquai followed that exact route in the 90's. But then again, I don't think you can call Jamiroquai disco! I can call it going from inspired music for the soul towards dancefloor-crazy sell-out! That's why I can't understand you linking the last few Jamiroquai albums to 'real, funky basslines', 'good grooves' and 'modern day chic'. If you like the last three Jamiroquai albums on those terms, wow, you must be hysterical about the first two!

@ Namepeace, great post. , the bonus track!

Sander said:

I disagree. Jamiroquai may never be 100% original..But it's authentic IMO. It's like some people who just have an affinty for a type of music. Trends come and go, but that person always loves whatever artist, sound, period. Like the sound of a fender rhodes will always sound 70's to me.

Now to the bassline comments. I am a huge Chic production fan. And I will say this Stuart Zenders basslines are the closest thing to the organic funk and groove of the mighty Bernard. Rhythm Guitar wise you will never top Nile.

But overall Jk's band has live instruments and background singers paying homage to a period of music that brought people together. The same can not be said for today's crap R&B, Shit Hop etc.

By the way I agree Dre's album was new and cool, but it's a much derived from J.B and P-Funk as any Jamiroquai jam. That other guy you mention Ginuwine does't deserve his name so close to Dre or JK.

And your term re-creating is a little alarming me to me.. They put beats and sliced samples, where JK has a live musician play a new melody, new song structure, with a vintage sound... Not sure how his music could not be considered artistically more challenging.
[Edited 4/19/08 7:46am]
[Edited 4/19/08 7:48am]

Sander said:

I agree with you. Personally, I don't think "Canned Heat" was more anymore successful at capturing the disco sound that "Cosmic Girl" was from TWM. In fact, it was more of a retread than anything, like 90% of "Synkronized" was. The melody itself was pretty modern to me and this threw the song off-track although there are some elements in "Canned Heat" which do manage to give off such a vibe.

Honestly, I never liked that song nor did I ever understand what all the fuss was about.

Sander said:

I agree with this too but that's not to say the last three albums have been terrible. The only one that applies to that is "Synkronized". They did sell out with "A Funk Odyssey" (songs like "Love Foolosophy"? ) but some of the material on that album I honestly do enjoy. "Dynamite" was more of a return to form but overall I think that the album was nowhere near as dynamic as Jamiroquai's first three.

Would I go to their last three for 'real, funky basslines', 'good grooves' and 'modern day chic'? Not really, outside of "You Give Me Something" (the best song they've done since Zender's departure) and a couple "Dynamite" tracks.

We seem to be on the same page here

love foolosophy is selling out??

eh?

i honestly do not understand your point?

how on earth is nailing a funky track like love foolosophy selling out?

I can't recommend you any Jamiroquai, as all of his albums are shit.

"Love Foolosophy" is NOT selling out.That's exactly the type of hook-laden dance track that most R&B artists should be doing right now,as opposed to the bland,boring shit hop crap they usually put out.

Okay.
You really should try some Jamiroquai.

Wow, this discussion is going in all directions and is becoming somewhat unfocused, but it seems as though:

soul4thought said:

We all seem to love Zender. Shall we call the last four albums by Jamiroquai Modern disco? Or does Nu-Disco have a nicer ring to it?