| Empire Central | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
 | ||||
| Studio album by | ||||
| Released | September 30, 2022 | |||
| Recorded | March 3–10, 2022 | |||
| Studio | Deep Ellum Art Company (Dallas, Texas) | |||
| Length | 94:28 | |||
| Label | GroundUP | |||
| Snarky Puppy chronology | ||||
| ||||
| Singles from Empire Central | ||||
| ||||
Empire Central is the fifteenth album and seventh live album [1] by American band Snarky Puppy. Released on September 30, 2022, on GroundUP Music, [2] it won Best Contemporary Instrumental Album at the 65th Grammy Awards. [3]
Empire Central was recorded live in front of a studio audience over the course of eight days at Deep Ellum Art Company, a converted venue space in Dallas, Texas. [4] [1] The album is an homage to Dallas's rich history of black music. Despite Snarky Puppy originating at University of North Texas in Denton, 30 miles away from Dallas, bandleader Michael League cited Dallas's gospel and R&B scene as what solidified the band's distinct sound. [5] [6] League named Dallas-based musicians Erykah Badu, RC Williams, Roy Hargrove (who partially inspired the track name "Cliroy"), Kirk Franklin, and Jason Moran as influences for the album. [7] [8]
Tracks on the album that allude to Dallas and Texas include "RL's", referring to South Dallas nightclub R.L.'s Blues Palace #2, [6] "Mean Green", named after the North Texas mascot, "Belmont", named for the street in Dallas where League lived, "Fuel City", named for a Texas gas station chain, [9] and "Trinity", named for Texas's Trinity River. [7]
The album features the last recorded performance of funk keyboardist Bernard Wright, who died in a car accident less than two months after the recording sessions. Appearing on the track "Take It!", Wright was described by League as Snarky Puppy's musical "godfather," having mentored many of the band's members and joining the band himself from 2007 to 2010. [6] [9] [10]
Before the album's release in 2022, Snarky Puppy previewed several tracks while on tour with Steely Dan. [8] [11] League credits Steely Dan as one of Snarky Puppy's largest influences, describing touring with them as "a dream." [8]
Empire Central draws influence from a variety of genres, including jazz, funk, blues, R&B, gospel, and hard rock. [2] [4] [7] Contrary to the band's previous albums, on which League provided most of the writing, Empire Central features original compositions by 12 different band members. [7] [10]
| Aggregate scores | |
|---|---|
| Source | Rating |
| Metacritic | 75/100 [12] |
| Review scores | |
| Source | Rating |
| AllMusic |   [2] |
| Jazzwise |  [13] |
| PopMatters | 6/10 [14] |
| The Telegraph | [15] |
| Uncut | 7/10 [16] |
Empire Central was met with largely positive reviews. At Metacritic, the album received an aggregate score of 75 based on 6 reviews, indicating "generally favorable reviews." [12]
AllMusic's Matt Collar called Empire Central "one of Snarky Puppy's most enjoyable and accessible albums to date," writing that it showcases "the group's longstanding knack for crafting groove-based instrumental tracks rife with hooky melodies, sophisticated arrangements, and exploratory improvisations." He assigned the album an AllMusic Album Pick. [2] In a positive review for Jazzwise , reviewer Hugh Morris called the album "a funkier, heavier, and noticeably slower-paced collection," and "a welcome return of the atmospheric, half-live recording so perfectly pitched on We Like It Here and the Family Dinner volumes." [13] Tina Edwards of The Telegraph praised the album's diverse global influences and old-fashioned sensibilities, calling it "as unclassifiable as it is virtuosic," while also noting it "feels like a collection of singles rather than a chronological record." [15] In a mixed review for JazzTimes , writer Morgan Enos called the music of Empire Central "rock-solid," while at the same time lacking "a certain je ne sais quoi " compared to Snarky Puppy's other albums. [5]
Writer credits adapted from Glide Magazine and GroundUP Music. [7] [17]
| No. | Title | Writer(s) | Length |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | "Keep It On Your Mind" | Michael League | 5:30 |
| 2. | "East Bay" | Chris Bullock | 5:11 |
| 3. | "Bet" | League | 5:33 |
| 4. | "Cliroy" | Jay Jennings | 4:45 |
| 5. | "Take It!" (feat. Bernard Wright) | Bobby Sparks | 6:39 |
| 6. | "Portal" | Marcelo Woloski | 5:12 |
| 7. | "Broken Arrow" | Justin Stanton | 7:19 |
| 8. | "RL's" | League | 9:22 |
| 9. | "Mean Green" | Nate Werth | 4:54 |
| 10. | "Fuel City" | Bill Laurance | 4:52 |
| 11. | "Free Fall" | Stanton | 3:50 |
| 12. | "Belmont" | League | 6:29 |
| 13. | "Pineapple" | Mike Maher, League | 4:56 |
| 14. | "Honiara" | Zach Brock, League, Maher | 6:50 |
| 15. | "Coney Bear" | Bob Lanzetti | 5:16 |
| 16. | "Trinity" | Mark Lettieri | 7:54 |
| Total length: | 94:28 | ||
Adapted from Snarky Puppy on YouTube.
Steely Dan is an American rock band founded in 1971 in New York by Walter Becker and Donald Fagen. Initially the band had a stable lineup, but in 1974 Becker and Fagen retired from live performances to become a studio-only band, opting to record with a revolving cast of session musicians. Rolling Stone has called them "the perfect musical antiheroes for the seventies".
Everything Must Go is the ninth studio album by American rock group Steely Dan. It was released on June 10, 2003, by Reprise Records, and was the band's second album following their 20-year studio hiatus spanning 1980 through 2000, when they released Two Against Nature. Everything Must Go is the band's most recent studio album and their last with founding member Walter Becker before his death in 2017.
Two Against Nature is the eighth studio album by American rock band Steely Dan. Their first studio album in 20 years, it was recorded from 1997 to 1999 and released on February 29, 2000, by Giant Records.
Edie Brickell & New Bohemians is an alternative rock jam band that originated in Dallas, Texas, in the mid-1980s. The band is widely known for their 1988 hit "What I Am" from the album Shooting Rubberbands at the Stars. Their music contains elements of rock, folk, blues, and jazz. Following the 1990 release of their second album Ghost of a Dog, lead singer Edie Brickell left the band and married singer-songwriter Paul Simon. In 2006, she and the band launched a new web site and released a new album, Stranger Things.
Bob Reynolds is an American jazz tenor saxophonist. A solo recording artist since 2000, he has been a member of the popular "genre-bending" instrumental group Snarky Puppy since 2014, winning Grammy Awards with the band for the albums Culcha VulchaLive at the Royal Albert Hall, and Empire Central.
Live is the final album by fusion band Return to Forever. It was recorded live at the Palladium in New York City on May 20th and 21st, 1977 as part of the tour to support the Musicmagic album. This was the only tour to feature the Musicmagic (1977) lineup, which included original members Chick Corea, Stanley Clarke and Joe Farrell, along with keyboardist/vocalist Gayle Moran, and a six-piece horn section.
Snarky Puppy is an American jazz fusion band led by bassist Michael League. Founded in 2004, Snarky Puppy combines a variety of jazz idioms, rock, world music, and funk and has won five Grammy Awards. Although the band has worked with vocalists, League described Snarky Puppy as "a pop band that improvises a lot, without vocals".
Trees is an American live music venue opened in 1990 in the Deep Ellum district of downtown Dallas, Texas. The venue has hosted international touring musical acts such as Nirvana, Snoop Dogg, The Flaming Lips, Death Grips, Daughter, The Wailers, Nick Jonas, and Run the Jewels. It has received numerous accolades from the Dallas Observer.
Sylva is an album by American jazz fusion group Snarky Puppy that was released on May 26, 2015. It was a collaboration between the band and the Metropole Orkest from the Netherlands. It won the Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Instrumental Album at the 58th Annual Grammy Awards. According to Michael League, each song on the album is about a different forest.
Amkeni is an album by Burundian singer-songwriter Bukuru Celestin and the jazz fusion group Snarky Puppy that was released in 2013. It is the first of two cooperative albums by Snarky Puppy and other performers that were recorded at the Jefferson Center in Roanoke, Virginia in 2013, with the second being Family Dinner – Volume 1.
Culcha Vulcha is an album by American jazz fusion group Snarky Puppy that was released on April 29, 2016. The album includes performances by a number of musicians associated with the band and called "the Fam". The band's first studio album in eight years since Bring Us the Bright, it was recorded at the Sonic Ranch in Tornillo, Texas near El Paso and Atlantic Sound Studios in Brooklyn, New York, by Nic Hard.
Michael League is an American composer, producer, and multi-instrumentalist. He is the bandleader of New York–based instrumental band Snarky Puppy and the international music ensemble Bokanté. He also founded the band Forq with keyboardist Henry Hey, and is also an owner and founder of the record label GroundUP Music. League has won five Grammy Awards.
Forq is an American jazz fusion band from New York and Texas.
Here If You Listen is an album by David Crosby and his collaborators Michael League, Becca Stevens, and Michelle Willis, who perform on tour together backing Crosby as The Lighthouse Band, and was released on October 26, 2018 by BMG Music.
Ghost-Note are a percussion-based funk, hip hop and jazz fusion group from Dallas, Texas, with a rotating membership based around founding drummer Robert "Sput" Searight and founding percussionist Nate Werth, two members of the jazz band Snarky Puppy. The group also includes bassist MonoNeon, keyboardist Dominique Xavier Taplin, saxophonist/flutist Michael Jelani Brooks, saxophonist/flutist Jonathan Mones, and saxophonist/flutist Sylvester Onyejiaka.
Immigrance is the thirteenth album by American jazz fusion group Snarky Puppy. It was released on March 15, 2019, and debuted at #2 on the Billboard Jazz Albums chart in the United States.
Shaun Martin is an American composer, arranger, producer, and multi-instrumental musician. Martin is a member of the jazz fusion band Snarky Puppy, as well as music director for Gospel music star Kirk Franklin, and former Minister of Music at Dallas’ Friendship-West Baptist Church. Martin has been awarded four Grammys for his work with Franklin and three as a member of Snarky Puppy.
This is a timeline documenting events of jazz in the year 2022.
Mark Lettieri is an American guitarist, composer and producer. He is a member of the jazz fusion band Snarky Puppy, funk band The Fearless Flyers, and also performs with his quartet, the Mark Lettieri Group. His background spans several genres including jazz, rock and funk. He has released seven solo albums. His 2021 album Deep: The Baritone Sessions Vol. 2 was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Instrumental Album.
Robert "Sput" Searight is an American drummer, composer and producer best known for his work with jazz fusion band Snarky Puppy and as co-founder of the percussion-based band Ghost-Note. His background spans several genres including jazz, funk, hip-hop and gospel. He has toured and recorded with a variety of artists including Kirk Franklin, Snoop Dogg, Justin Timberlake, Erykah Badu and Toto. He has received a Grammy award for his work on the album God's Property.