Jon Batiste. WE ARE Verve Records, 2021

Abstract

With the release of his sixth studio album, WE ARE (2021), Jon Batiste transformed from late night bandleader to center-stage popular music celebrity. The album helped secure five GRAMMY awards for Batiste and his team and garnered critical and commercial success. A multi-genre offering, WE ARE received nods in R&B, contemporary classical, and American roots awards categories. The album comes in at thirteen tracks with a 38-minute play time. There is also a nineteen-track deluxe edition that adds five remixes and the 12/8 soul jam “WORK IT OUT.” Conceptually, WE ARE is a multi-genre excavation of U.S. popular music that bridges the gap between the politics of the Civil Rights era and the summer of 2020 Black Lives Matter protests, which inspired the creation of the album’s title track. Batiste is a member of one of New Orleans’s most respected musical families. His father, Michael, is a member of the Batiste Brothers Band and played bass with Jackie Wilson and Isaac Hayes on the so-called “Chitlin’ Circuit.” Growing up, Batiste lived just outside of New Orleans in Kenner, but WE ARE leans strongly into the New Orleans aspects of Batiste’s upbringing. The ethical center of “TELL THE TRUTH” is built around Michael Batiste’s parting words before his son left for Juilliard: “I’m thinking ‘bout my papa/now that I’m a star ... before you drive off, boy/better know who you are/ He said tell it like it is.” The “Uptown” remix of the track from the deluxe album reimagines the song as a Black Masking Indian chant featuring Big Chief Romeo Bougere of the 9th Ward Hunters and the 79rs Gang on vocals and Michael Batiste on a stank-face-inducing electric bass. “BOY HOOD,” “MOVEMENT 11,” and “ADULTHOOD” make up a mini suite in the middle of the album. The intentional space between “boy” and “hood” in “BOY HOOD”’s title evokes the state of being a boy and the neighborhoods of Batiste’s childhood as he sings about No Limit soldiers, bubblegum, church on Sundays, and the pre-2008 colors of a Popeye’s bag (red, white, and blue). Joining him on the track are alumni of two of his high school music programs: PJ Morton, who is a graduate of St. Augustine High School, and Troy “Trombone Shorty” Andrews, who was classmates with Batiste at the New Orleans Center for the Creative Arts (NOCCA). “BOY HOOD” pays homage to New Orleans hip-hop with bounce-like high hats on a beat produced by Florida native Jahaan Sweet.