JIM: Spark From The Past (2015)

[RATING: 5] French beatmaker JIM fans the embers of ’90s cinematic grooves/ downtempo breaks/ abstract hip-hop – call it what you want (actually don’t call it ‘abstract hip-hop’) with Spark From The Past, his new seventeen tracker for Franco-Greek label Melting Records. Indeed it’s not just the embers of the ’90s getting fanned for as the man himself says – he takes, “inspiration from the devastating grooves and hypnotic melodies of the 1960s and 70s” and very enjoyable time he seems to have had of it – an experience which the listener quickly gets to share.

What experience is that then? Oh you know – the dusty old jazz samples, the crackly breaks, the odd rap or female chanteuse here or there – nothing you haven’t heard many times before in short. But that’s the thing, if you tread a previously well-trod path, you’d better do it very well in order to stand out. And that’s precisely what JIM manages. There’s something of a RZA-esque feel to these beats in their soulful minimalism which is only enhanced on those with eastern samples like In The Shadows We Are and Far In The West. So much so that if I were JIM, I’d be daily pestering Lone Ninja to allow me to make some beats for him. Best chilled breaks heard round these parts in a long while. Lovely.
(Out 7 June on Melting Records)