Sly & the Family Stone harnessed all of the disparate musical and social trends of the late '60s, creating a wild, brilliant fusion of soul, rock, R&B, psychedelia, and funk that broke boundaries down without a second thought.
What is acid jazz of the Soft Emotions band? It is a combination of soft, easy emotions and powerful, tough sound of the band; fashionable rhythmic textures and traditions of the jazz mainstream; original harmonic consecutions and blues stop; strict arrangements and freestyle improvisations.
Historically, the Solar Project is associated with the Doo-Bop Sound, as the St. Petersburg trumpeter Igor Shilov was among the founders of both bands.
Soulive is all about danceable, organ-driven instrumental groove-jazz. Their success is a result of fusing the soul-jazz of the past with a modern hip-hop feel. Krasno's spidery yet very direct guitar lines recall Grant Green. The rhythmic concepts employed date back to those learned from artists such as James Brown, Stevie Wonder, and Sly Stone.
In the mid-'90s, percussionist Chris Bangs and keyboardist Mick Talbot united while working on a project for the acid jazz unit Galliano. Since then they have put their energies into forming the music of Soundscape UK, which takes the soul and disco sounds of the '70s and morphs them into smooth, acid jazz grooves heavy on sax and vibes.
One of the few producers to pursue a real fusion of jazz and house music, Frenchman Ludovic Navarre began recording in the early '90s using various aliases (Subsystem, Modus Vivendi, Deepside) for a range of French imprints.
In 2001, the famous Russian ska-punk band Spitfire started a spin-off project called St. Petersburg Ska-Jazz Review in collaboration with members of the St. Petersburg-based, Afro-Caribbean band Markscheider Kunst.
With her warm, lyrical voice and poetic sense for interpreting standards, singer Stacey Kent is the epitome of jazz sophistication.