Rating: NNN
Ten years after his first album, you’d think Greyboy might have exhausted the possibilities of his West Coast instrumental soul-jazz-hiphop sound. Adding some vocalists helped, especially contributions from soul shouter Sharon Jones (who’s in town this Friday at Lee’s Palace). There’s a sparse, tight and modern feel to much of the album, and at times a surprisingly electronic ambience. On the other hand, a lot of it also seems overly indebted to a certain mid-90s shuffle beat that played out quite some time ago. Hiphop has evolved many more variations since then, but Greyboy doesn’t seem to have noticed.
