Here Because of Hope

One of the takeaways from <b>Ezra Collective</b>’s <i>Here Because of Hope</i> is that you can learn a lot about the history of a people from the music they dance to—in this case, the reggae, calypso and Afrobeat of the Afro Caribbean diaspora in England during the 20th and early 21st century. The band, who once said they took their template from Robert Glasper’s work on Kendrick Lamar’s <i>To Pimp a Butterfly</i>, are a distinctly modern phenomenon: at once a callback to the days when jazz was primarily dance music, and an example of what it can sound like in the post-hip-hop era. Here, they slip effortlessly between the heavy-footedness of reggae (<b>“Blow Your Trumpet”</b>) and the lightness of soca (<b>“Sweet Echo”</b>), horn-led instrumentals (about two-thirds of the album) and vocal features for singers as different as the English (to Gambian parents) rapper Pa Salieu (<b>“Only Love”</b>) and the reggae revivalist Lila Iké (<b>“Well Organised”</b>). (And if you’re wondering where the salsa of <b>“El Corazon”</b> came from, remember the slave trade’s influence on Latin music as it passed through Cuba.) At heart, it’s a party record, straight-up—but, like great party records, one with a history and conscience, backlit by resilience, endurance and joy.