Barrett Joins Jazz and ’90’s-Style Hip Hop on New Album Out Feb. 7, 2025 Via dB Studios
“It is both moving and potentially transformative to listen to Darren Barrett… It is easy to be transfixed… not just a reminder, but a demonstration of what might happen through experimenting more with our shared music.”
–DownBeat Magazine
“Exhilarating”
–Jazziz
“Adventurous.”
–All Music
After releasing two acclaimed albums this year, trumpetist/multi-instrumentalist/composer Darren Barrett, who has played on Esperanza Spalding’s GRAMMY-winning album Radio Music Society, will kick off 2025 with dB-ish: Straight Vibesss. Drawing inspirations from J Dilla, among others, the album, which comes out February 7 on his own dB Studios, and marries ‘90s-style hip hop beats with jazz. (dB-ish is Barrett’s experimental jazz project.) This dovetails with Barrett’s mission to push the envelopes of what defines jazz, including mixing other genres. The first single, “dB’s Vibesss,’ is out now, kicking off the album with a crisp beat reminiscent of Dilla. Other instruments join in one by one, first live drums then bass, keys and then the trumpet.
“dB’s Vibesss” public stream (HEAR/SHARE)
Barrett, who resides in Boston, lived in New York through much of the 1990s. “The music of artists such as The Notorious BIG, Nas, Mobb Deep, J Dilla, Wu-Tang Clan, 2Pac, and N.W.A. was music I listened to just as much as Miles Davis, Charlie Parker, Donald Byrd, Clifford Brown, and Art Blakey,” he recalls, continuing, “This recording was a dream project that these incredible musicians helped me to realize with their limitless talents.”
He adds, “As a kid, I grew up making beats programming the Akai MPC 60 drum machine and am now using the Akai MPC Live II. The hardest part of this project was getting the band to lock into the MPC Live II drum machine, to make it sound cohesive, as if the MPC was another band member. We worked on having musical elasticity even though playing to a drum machine.”
With Barrett on trumpet and beats, the band includes keyboardist Santiago Bosch (Donald Harrison, Kurt Rosenwinkel, Esperanza Spalding) and Warren Pettey, who has performed at Newport Jazz Festival, on keys. YoungChae Jeong holds down the bottom end on bass. Julian Miltenberger and Tobias Israel each play drums.
The album features both Detroit and west coast grooves as its foundation, with the band stretching out in musical explorations, winding its way through a variety of moods. “Julian’s Vibesss” brings an R&B tinge, reminiscent of D’Angelo, one of the big-name players who Barrett has accompanied. “YoungChae’s Vibesss” could soundtrack a Detroit party before morphing into an almost-free evolution and then returning to the relentless groove. The bass line of “Warren’s Vibesss” recalls southern soul while the drum machine conjures Los Angeles. The album closes with the foot-tapping “Santiago’s Vibesss,” with harmonically shifting chords atop an impossibly-funky breakbeat before a coda that features the synth and reverb-laden trumpet in deep conversation.
Barrett released two albums last year to acclaim from the Boston Globe, American Blues Scene, Jazziz, Glide Mag, ArtsFuse, Twisted Soul, and beyond. DownBeat said of the two albums ‘dB-ish: The Path To Our Truth’ and ‘The Get Down 4 Real: Step Step Steppin’,’ “It seems the Berklee professor is demonstrating that there are multiple ways of getting there [to truth],” denoted DownBeat Magazine. Barrett saw tracks added to Tidal’s official playlist Out There: Best New Jazz and Pandora stations Funk Jazz, Jazzy Brunch, Horizons: Tomorrow’s Jazz, and Avant Garde Jazz/Free Jazz. It’s Psychedelic Baby Mag lauded Barrett as “groundbreaking.”
Mentored by Donald Byrd, Barrett performed or recorded with Wayne Shorter, Kenny Garrett, Kurt Rosenwinkel, Elvin Jones, Jackie McLean, Herbie Hancock, Roy Hargrove Big Band, Common, will.i.am, Tabou Combo, D’Angelo, Queen Latifah, The Baylor Project, and Antonio Hart.
Barrett has built a substantial following on social media, totaling over 75,000 followers across platforms. His Instagram account, @darrendbee, has 57.7k followers. His YouTube account is a deep dive into the musical territory of dB-ish and beyond, entitled All Things Brass and Technology.
dB-ish: Straight Vibesss track listing
1. dB’s Vibesss
2. Julian’s Vibesss
3. YoungChae’s Vibesss
4. Warren’s Vibesss
5. Santiago’s Vibesss
