Dec
14
De Phazz
December 14, 2005 | Leave a Comment
I first encountered De Phazz on the La Suite Hôtel Costes album. Pompougnac selected ‘Jazz Music’ as track 2. for his collection and I don’t recall getting much past it thanks to constant replaying.
It never even crossed my mind that De Phazz might be German. Why would anyone, right? As an Amazon.de reviewer of ‘Death by Chocolate’ puts it: “German music doesn’t have to morph into obsessive airplay-friendliness or dreadful Indie Noise.” Quite.
As far as I can see De Phazz are the brainchild of Heidelburger Pit Baumgartner and some very talented pals. The aptly-titled ‘Death By Chocolate’ is their third album and is er, choc full of smooth jazz beats, funky strings and surprisingly eloquent lyrics laden more often than not with some very Brit-like caustic wit. Check out “Something Special” with catchy refrain “I would swim the waters just like Brian Jones” or the title track itself with the sleaziest Frank Butcher-like photographer you’ll ever have heard looping “Not too classy, not too down and out . . . just nice” over horns to die for.
Death By Chocolate
(0% native)
Excellent. Versatile, smooth and SHOCK! an ambient album that isn’t dull as hell. Standout tracks are hard to pick out as all are brilliant, but try these: ‘Jazz Music’, ‘Death By Chocolate’, ‘Jim the Jinn’.
De Phazz fuse Latin, Club, Jazz, Electric guitar, some French and a gazillion other things into something that works and is well-defined enough for them to be a very successful live act across Europe. As Pit himself says: “We view all these different styles as a window through which we see the known and the new.”