The Cinematic Orchestra

Cinematic Orchestra are a six-piece jazz band, but they don't play jazz, at least not in the traditional sense. Rather, they sound closer to the “live-house” school of Frederic Galliano and Carl Craig's Innerzone Orchestra, in the way they use traditional acoustic instruments, but incorporate very slight touches of reverb, DJ scratching, synth-strings and samples of abstract sound to bring out a new dimension to their otherwise seemingly improv-based tracks. The crew's groove, however is rhythmically still closer to jazz than house or even hip-hop, but laced with these elements of studio tension, the totality is less about genre and more about the “motion” of sound. Coupled with the occasional break-beat, the drumming on the album is so dissonant that at times, it’s almost inhuman. Yet it's probably some of the most mentally engaging beat-work to come out of this scene.