Roxana Amed Becoming Human (2024) [Official Digital Download]

×

Roxana Amed Becoming Human (2024) [Official Digital Download]

Close

Argentine vocalist Roxana Amed envelopes you in a warm, poetic atmosphere on her 11th album, 2024's Becoming Human. On past albums, the Miami-based Amed has explored her distinctive blend of post-bop with South American musical traditions. Along with jazz, she has also studied Spanish Literature and film and brings a broad-minded set of influences and creativity to bear on her music. Here, she crafts sculptural songs loosely conceptualized around the theme of an artist's life from birth to death. Helping her achieve this heady vibe is her longtime collaborative ensemble featuring keyboardist Martin Bejerano, saxophonist Mark Small, trombonist Kendall Moore, bassist Edward Pérez, and drummer Ludwig Afonso. This is the same group Amed featured on both 2020's Ontology and 2021's Unanime, and very much feels like a continuation of the sound of those recordings. Blessed with a warm, dusky voice and knack for composing lyrics that feel like sung poems, Amed is the central focus of the music here. That said, she often blends into the ensemble like a lead instrument, even singing in wordless vocalese as on "Destello," where she duets with saxophonist Small on the dewy melody. Elsewhere, she explores a variety of jazz sounds, leaping into the driving modal hard bop style of John Coltrane on "Then We Built a Home" and embracing a more contemporary blend of synthy fusion and EDM-esque rhythmic grooves on "Those Horses Running in the Mist." The rest of the album follows suit as Amed splits the difference between the precise tone poetry of Norma Winstone and the earthy jazz lyricism of Abbey Lincoln. The evocative combination is particularly evident on cuts like "Climbing Up My Spine" and "Our Days of Summer," angular, noir-ish ballads that, as with much of Becoming Human, balance the cerebral atmosphere of a black box theater performance with a jazzy, night club sensuality.