Neneh Cherry & The Thing
The Cherry Thing
(Smalltown Supersound)

Heavy, undulating bass lines alongside very ominously winding saxophone solos and riffs encompass the foundation of The Cherry Thing, the new album from Neneh Cherry & The Thing. The wickedly-crafted instrumental pieces of bass and woodwind instruments set precedence on most tracks on this free form experimental jazz project. Stylistically, the album feels like a cathartic lullaby mostly. To most mainstream music listeners, Neneh Cherry is known for her late 80’s smash of an album, Raw Like Sushi and her super hit single, “Buffalo Stance.” Since then, she has worked collaboratively with many different artists such as Massive Attack, Ed Kowalczyk of the group Live, Speech of the rap group Arrested Development, Michael Stipe, the Gorillaz, Pulp and Youssou N’Dour to name a very few. On her latest album, she is joined by The Thing, an experimental jazz group named after her father, renowned jazz musician Don Cherry. Largely an album of covers, the remake of Suicide’s “Dream Baby Dream” is a hypnotic mantra that warmly wraps itself into its own sweaty meandering rhythms. “Too Tough to Die” begins with a careening dark saxophone run and breaks away rhythmically. Cherry’s voice remains steady and sauntering as the centerpiece that strongly holds everything together. Moody, dark and at times woozy, The Cherry Thing offers a whimsical dive into a realm far from the safe and calm shorelines of mainstream music and infallibly offers something more risky and free.