Nimbus Sextet are a hot young jazz outfit hailing from Glasgow who in the midst of all this pandemic madness have just released their debut album on the mighty Acid Jazz label. ‘Dreams Fulfilled’ is a confident, swashbuckling and multi-limbed record that avoids the trap of following whatever the sound of the moment is and allows the players to express the many influences that they are made of, whether it’s post-bop, hip hop or a broader global funk influence. There’s a ton of groove going on throughout from the UK street soul jazz drive of their first single ‘Trap Door’, the Jazzanova sounding ‘Lily White’ or the vibey modal nine minutes of the title track. This isn’t deeply cryptic jazz, there’s plenty of crossover appeal and it’s easy to see why a bidding war ensued for these young men’s exclusivity. Another welcome addition to the evolving UK jazz scene.
“Jazz is a byword for freedom of expression and improvisation. Like us as human beings, it can be whatever it wants to be. This is the key message I want to express with Nimbus Sextet”
I pinged a few questions to bandleader Joe Nichols (keys, harmonica) to find out a bit more…
JT - Tell us about your sound and where it comes from.
Joe - I’ve been playing with Mischa Stevens (bass) and Alex Palmer (drums) for six years now. Nimbus Sextet evolved from a previous jazz-funk group of ours, and took our sound in a more jazz-based direction. We’ve fostered an intuitive musical telepathy, with a special attention to relatable melodies and rhythmic interplay. We have always written music together from the ground up, and we are constantly re-writing our material to accommodate new ideas. We take inspiration from lots of different types of music, rather than being restricted to one ‘sound’. Several of us compose tunes for the band, so our music is constantly moving in different directions.
What is now the Nimbus Sextet sound has a rich personal history for me. As a kid, starting on drums at the age of 7 and then moving to piano and harmonica in my early teens, music was always something that I approached intuitively, on my own accord if you like. I’ve never had a piano lesson, and I use my ear and perfect pitch to write, create and perform music. It’s not been a typical musical trajectory by any means: I haven’t been to jazz school, I am self-taught and I don’t really read music. Throughout my musical journey, it’s been particularly important for me to collaborate with players who are forging their own path musically, who are guided by their ear.
In their own ways, everyone in Nimbus Sextet takes a maverick approach to music. I think a large part of that comes from approaching the music with an open mind, and letting it dictate to us where it wants to go. We assimilate musical influences and sounds from all over the place; be that post-bop, hip-hop, West African music, neo-soul, electronic music. Our debut album, ‘Dreams Fulfilled’, is a melting pot of musical influences and sounds. It makes a statement that we won’t be pigeonholed musically, and that we will open doors to many musical worlds along the way. Jazz is a byword for freedom of expression and improvisation. Like us as human beings, it can be whatever it wants to be. This is the key message I want to express with Nimbus Sextet.
Nimbus Sextet
Has being located in Scotland been important for your development?
We’re very privileged to be part of a vibrant Scottish scene. We have all cut our teeth here musically, in its many DIY scenes. Mischa, Alex, and I basically grew up together as part of Edinburgh’s jazz and roots music scenes. Mischa heads his own a capella folk group (The Moonlands), and was in the past a core member of Edinburgh’s West African drumming troupes. Our saxophonist Martin Fell is half-Czech but was born and raised in Scotland. He runs his own gypsy jazz band. He is very well versed in klezmer and Eastern European music, and is a part of the thriving roots music scene here in Glasgow. Euan Allardice (trumpet) plays regularly with a Cuban band, and has done everything from musical theatre to jazz. James Mackay (guitar) is currently studying at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, which has become a really important institution for musicians to meet and perform together. Personally, I grew up immersed in artists like John Martyn and Shooglenifty just as much as I did Herbie Hancock and John Coltrane. Scotland’s open-minded music community and rich musical tapestry has definitely shaped all of us.
The ‘Nu Jazz’ term has been probably overused and seems to me to be very London-centric in its focus. What do you think/feel about the name and do you feel a part of it?
‘Nu-Jazz’ is definitely a buzz-word right now. I understand it as a new expression of jazz drawing on hip-hop, neo-soul, house, drum and bass and dance music influences, largely borne out of London, New York and Los Angeles. Artists like Kamasi Washington, Thundercat, Ezra Collective, Kamaal Williams and Alfa Mist are proponents of this music to a certain extent. I think it’s a restrictive term though. It is a constantly evolving artform that incorporates fresh sounds. If you look at the history of jazz, there’s always been ‘nu-jazz’ - something modern that breaks the mould. Mainstream ‘traditional’ jazz was the ‘nu-jazz’ that came after Dixieland. Be-bop was ‘nu-jazz’. Post-bop was ‘nu-jazz’. Free jazz was literally known as ‘The New Music’. The ‘paradigm shift’ interpretation of ideas only goes so far with jazz. It is a progressive music, always at the vanguard of creativity, yet as ‘jazz’ artists we’ve also got to respect our musical ancestors, within jazz and beyond. Jazz is culturally reflexive and reflective.
Nimbus Sextet’s influences are diverse, and draw on the past as much as they do present. While we love the Brownswood sound and the L.A. scene, Duke Ellington and Sly & The Family Stone are just as important to us. We are a Scottish group finding our place within the London ‘nu-jazz’ scene, and while that is really exciting, we have to work twice as hard for our place within it. What’s equally exciting though is that our melting pot sound can take us in many different directions, to audiences young and old. We are nu-jazz, and we are world jazz. We meld hip-hop and post-bop. We want to make the most of that versatility when the world opens back up again. I can’t wait to see where things take us!
Tomorrow’s Warriors and Total Refreshment Centre have been important cogs in the development of recent UK jazz, have you been a part of this? Is there a similar petri-dish of talent and help up North?
There is a massive amount of jazz talent in Scotland, especially here in Glasgow. What’s special about the Glasgow jazz scene is that its players are multi-hyphenated, and are often part of DIY and underground music scenes. The dedicated jazz course at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland nurtures players from many disciplines too. Martin (sax) and James (guitar) both studied at the RCS, but otherwise we all come from DIY music scenes and backgrounds. I am a member of an alt-pop group (Rambootan) that fuses influences from folk to funk. Alex (drums) has played in tech metal, blues, synth rock and all sorts of other bands. Graham Costello (Graham Costello’s STRATA, Gearbox Records) is another perfect example of a young musician who’s been exposed to different sides of the music scene in Glasgow, growing up as part of experimental rock and noise bands as well as being an in demand jazz drummer and composer.
Folk musicians, singer-songwriters and electronic artists all collaborate with jazz musicians here. It's the unpretentious, welcoming, yet musically daring side to the Glasgow jazz scene that makes it so special. It’s becoming harder and harder for the UK jazz scene to ignore us now, what with Luca Manning, Fergus McCreadie, Georgia Cecile, STRATA, corto.alto, Mezcla and AKU! all making waves in the south. We are now an integral part of the UK jazz scene’s musical output. None of us have been part of Tomorrow’s Warriors, nor other London based young jazz initiatives, but we have grown up playing together in a really strong Scottish music scene. Nimbus Sextet are equally proud to be flying the flag for Scotland and the UK in the many countries that have recently taken to our music.
How has releasing an album in this weird climate been? I bet you’re itching to perform!
We are over the moon about the release of ‘Dreams Fulfilled’, our debut album which is out now on Acid Jazz Records. We wish more than anything that we could perform right now and ride the wave of enthusiasm and momentum that has come from the release of our album. The pandemic has stopped us from gigging, of course, but we’ve adapted our creative approach to the climate. We’ve enjoyed recording our new live videos, releasing singles, and promoting the record on socials. We have a jam-packed album campaign, despite the pandemic. We are releasing three live videos in tandem with the singles - ‘Trap Door’ and ‘Lily White’ - and the album, so that people can still watch us perform and experience our passion and energy. Our video of ‘Trap Door’ premiered on Jazzed, which was hugely vindicating for us. That was very well received, and we can’t wait for the next two video releases, which will be out in the next couple of months.
What do you want to do next? Sounds to explore, artists to collaborate with?
We’ve written lots of new music. We already have a second album’s worth of new material, which we are workshopping in these quieter months. We are beginning to explore more world music influenced compositions, as well as dance music inspired material. I already have some guest artists in mind to collaborate with for these pieces. Nimbus Sextet are looking to play international jazz festivals and venues across the globe when the world is ready, and to see where the beautiful reception the album has received will take us.
We’ve been through so many ups and downs over the past two years before getting to this stage, but I’m aware that it is just the beginning for Nimbus Sextet. We’ve been equally humbled and vindicated in the approach that we took in making the ‘Dreams Fulfilled’ album, and we’re incredibly excited to see where it takes us next.