Jamiroquai Dynamite booms with newest album

Mike Newmark Assistant Arts Editor

If consistency could be represented in terms of structures, Jamiroquai would be a bank vault. In the world of modern mainstream pop, there has been nothing as dependable as a Jamiroquai album, whether it read Emergency on Planet Earth, Traveling Without Moving or A Funk Odyssey on its front cover. Not only did all of their albums feature the same appealing blend of pop, funk and disco, but they were all good with a capital G; none have yet stood out as truly remarkable or truly abominable.
When Dynamite’s opening track, “Feels Just Like It Should,” invaded my little dorm room with its charismatic, big-beat stomp, it seemed to me that Dynamite had finally switched things up. Though it reminded me of the kind of music that Me'Shell NdegéOcello and the Chemical Brothers might make if they ever ran into each other in a dark alley, this was ultimately a redefined and revitalized Jamiroquai. “Feels Just Like It Should” is chock full of funk, confrontational beats, vocoder-ized guitar and all manner of dark synths and robotic sound effects—the kind of music that Jamiroquai, frankly, should have made earlier in their career.

The first track sounded like dynamite, alright, but does the rest of the album live up to its explosive title? Well, not really, but that certainly doesn’t mean it’s not good. In fact, that’s exactly what Dynamite is—another good, solid Jamiroquai album to add to the list. Following “Feels Just Like It Should,” the mid-tempo disco jam “Dynamite” kicks in and suddenly we’re steeped in all-too-familiar territory, with slap bass and slick vocals and guitars that go wickey-wah all over the place. It’s not a bad song by any stretch—you could even do “The Hustle” to it if you really wanted to—but listening to “Dynamite,” as well as “Electric Mistress,” “Starchild,” and “Talulah,” gave me the nagging feeling that I’ve heard these songs before.

It follows from this that Dynamite’s strongest numbers are those that stray from the disco-funk “Jamiroquai formula.” In addition to the brilliant “Feels Just Like It Should,” the acoustic-led third track, “Seven Days In Sunny June,” counteracts the middling “Dynamite” with its sunny, effortless funk that rings with a genuine 1970s singer/songwriter vibe. Minimal may not seem like an adjective that could ever be associated with Jamiroquai, but a few understated, well-placed instruments make “World That He Wants” perhaps the most emotional song the band has yet penned. And through it all, it still sounds like Jamiroquai, albeit a Jamiroquai that believes it has the power to make music other than tasteful funk and disco.

Such radical approaches are not entirely foolproof, however, and a couple wild stabs at variation (“Black Devil Car” and “Hot Tequila Brown”) end up missing the mark. Still, Jamiroquai’s discography could greatly benefit from more of this kind of risk-taking. Enough disco, already; Jay Kay and the gang have put together some mighty fine booty-shakers over their decade-plus career, but now it’s time for the band to grow up. Indeed, Dynamite reveals glimmers of the great things they can accomplish by expanding their horizons and their palette, but they’re going to have to see these plans to completion if they hope to turn their albums from merely good to affirmably masterful.