Sasha Frere-Jones on Hypnotic Brass Ensemble

"A few years ago, the band played a street show on Portobello Road in London, within earshot of a man named Alan Scholefield, who owns a nearby record store called Honest Jon’s. He also runs a record label called Honest Jon’s, with Damon Albarn (of Gorillaz, and of the nineties Britpop band Blur). … In 2008, Albarn gave Hypnotic the use of his London studio to make a record for the label. That album, also self-titled, is a compilation of sorts—it features rerecorded versions of songs from Hypnotic’s self-released CDs, plus 'Rabbit Hop,' a song by the eccentric New York composer Moondog, and 'Alyo,' a composition by their father. In most cases, the new recordings are an improvement. 'Ballicki Bone,' a song from the band’s second album (the green one), was originally a somewhat sluggish mid-tempo showcase for stately trumpet lines. The new version features a quicker pace and harder drumming, and better reflects the tightly organized unit that Hypnotic has become. … [T]he band has absorbed the biggest electronic music of the last century (hip-hop), filtered it through America’s century-old classic music (jazz), and made it portable" ("Pop Music," New Yorker, 6/8-15/09, p. 116).