“It felt like a remedy to some of the existential stress we were feeling during the time,” says songwriter, composer and producer Khari Lucas aka Contour and one half of Black Decelerant. “Simultaneously being in the height of lockdown and thinking about encroaching fascism and anti-Blackness, in the US especially, the making of the record felt very meditative and offered a dimension to ground us.” The urgency of the pandemic may have lifted, but the political and social necessity has not, and the duo’s reflections ring throughout Reflections Vol. 2: Black Decelerant - their jazz-driven sonic experimentation debut and the second in the RVNG Reflections series

Working across multiple media, Lucas skirts between jazz, soul and psych having collaborated with TELFAR, Dweller, and Locally Grown. And it is with jazz in mind that in 2016 he joined forces with experimental musician and artist Omari Jazz and set about turning the genre on its head. The original driving force behind the project was to use a novel musical approach to riff on “themes of Black being and nonbeing, life and mourning, expansion and limitation, and the individual and collective”. With their name inspired by Aria Dean’s Notes on Blacceleration, the pair are looking to regain a moment of stillness and this sentiment is reflected in their subtle, measured and potent music that is concurrently run through with the spirit of jazz and its aesthetic of innovation, complexity and politics. The pair use the electronic goodness at their fingertips - Ableton Live, Prophet Rev2, Korg Minilogue XL, Ibanez Soundgear Bass, and Peavey Reactor Guitar to create expansive piano and guitar lines, percussion and pervasive bass occasionally supplemented by the searing trumpet of Jawwaad Taylor. Oh and don’t be confused like I was - the track numbers on Reflections Vol. 2: Black Decelerant are not in ascending order.

The album opens with ‘Three’ – an example of classic ambient, or at least it starts out that way. There’s an ethereal aura as triplets of notes punctuate the calm, rolling with the jazz-like percussion, guitar in the background accompanied by soaring synth. This is followed by ‘One’ which showcases slightly discordant tempered piano, with hints of melody as the jazz nudges its way through.  ‘Six’ leans more heavily on stuttering guitar and piano; effects-laden and replete with glitch before heading into its strong synth ending, while ‘Two’ features the aforementioned Taylor with its looping sonic trumpet, supported beautifully by the quick strum of the guitar. The trumpeter returns later for the haunting ‘Eight’ which loops birdsong with backward tape manipulation.

‘Seven ½’ is a short interlude - a pitched-down vocal sample from an episode of Black Journal, the first nationally televised public affairs program produced for, about, and (eventually) by African Americans. The multilayered electronic looping of modular synth in ‘Nine’ is enticing with its building dynamic and this approach is used once again in bonus track ‘Ten’ albeit with an underlying bass line that transforms the track completely.

This album really is a triumph. It exploits the spirit of jazz and its political centre propelling it into a novel sonic sphere. Listen here.