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W
hat you are engaging with at this moment is a vision. Put aside the literal,
sensual language for a moment: Whether you are looking at the package,
or holding the CD in your hand, or actually listening to the music itself, there is
a vision before you. It belongs to singer Gillian Margot, and Black Butterfly is its
premiere document.
Again, a caveat on that language. Margot has recorded under her own name
before, or at least under the name of the Gillian Margot Trio—whose A Pink Filled
Sky was independently released in 2010. But that, she says, was a different vision, one that came collectively from the trio. Black Butterfly, by contrast, she
regards as the debut of Gillian Margot, individual artist. “[I wanted] something
that was more me,” she says. “I’ve certainly been recorded, but haven’t put out
my own album until now. This is it, this is really it: the first time that I’ve really
done my own thing.”
So what is that thing she’s doing? Well, first and foremost it’s jazz of the
highest caliber, the kind that has garnered her a following in her hometown
of Toronto and residencies in places like Singapore, Hong Kong, and Shanghai.
There’s no mistaking it in Margot’s delivery: soulful and robust--a voice you
might say was built like a brick house--but also sensuous, carefully sculpted to
the contours of each song; her precise articulation; her rhythms, simultaneously
poised and playful.
Then, of course, there’s Jeremy Pelt, also a top-shelf jazz exponent. As a trumpet player, he appears only on one track. But he’s also Black Butterfly’s arranger
and producer, Margot’s closest collaborator and adviser. “Jeremy and I met briefly
through various musician friends over the last decade,” she recalls. “Maybe five
or six years ago, we met again and started talking about music. We just found
ourselves in these conversations about songs. He and I have this in common;
we love to dig out old, obscure standards. Eventually he started slowly trying to
convince me that we should do some work together. ‘You should really come and
do the album with me. We should do this!’”
The band, too, comprises jazz musicians at the top of their game. Bassist
Richie Goods must be mentioned first; his firm ostinato lines and remarkably
complex fills represent both the band’s cornerstone and its keystone. “I saw Jeremy perform in Toronto, at the Rex Hotel, and he had Richie Goods on bass,” she
says. “I’d heard him before but this time I immediately said, ‘This is the bassist I’m
using. This is where it starts!’ This guy, the way he played the bass, is the way I
think about bass and the way I think it should be.”
That meant finding a drummer to be his foil; Kendrick Scott quickly proved an
ideal choice. “It was kind of a no-brainer that this guy be in the band and on the
album,” Margot says. “Kendrick, for me, brings so much to the table; he makes it so
interesting, creates such a perfect setting for the moods of every one of these songs.”
Margot was not initially familiar with keyboardist Anthony Wonsey. “But as
soon as I met him, I realized that he was a good fit. It’s important to me to have
an accompanist who, just from an inflection in my voice or a rhythmic idea that I
might communicate, they pick up on it, like an idiomatic reference, and Anthony
was right there with me at every moment.”
Margot and her accompanists, then, were squarely pedigreed in jazz. The
repertoire, though, was…somewhat less so. The songs include one standard; an
original blues; and a George Cables composition with new, original lyrics. Aside
from these, there is an old Cuban song and six tunes drawn from the worlds of
pop and R&B. But that, too, is Margot, doing her own thing.
“Jeremy and I share a love of music that was kinda my parents’ music—‘70s
and ‘80s stuff,” she explains. “A lot of funk, and maybe some disco stuff where
there’s a funk aspect; good lyrics, good melody, good groove, good vibe. That’s
always informed my approach to jazz. It just started to seep into what we were
doing, what we were talking about and thinking, and it sort of developed a life of
its own.”
One need only hear the opening track, “Black Butterfly,” to know how true
that is. Wonsey casts a luminous scrim on Fender Rhodes; the melody that
emerges from it (along with a laid-back fusion groove) is Cables’s “Ebony Moonbeams.” The lyrics, however, are Margot’s, and paint the same cosmic picture as
the original Cables title by writing around that idea of ebony moonbeams and its
implications. Wonsey’s solo is also cosmic, and fleshes out the groove, too.
The classic gospel (complete with organ!) that begins “The Makings of You”
likely won’t bring to mind Curtis Mayfield’s lush soul production. But it didn’t
take deep digging to uncover this aspect. “It already is almost a gospel tune,
even lyrically,” Margot says. “No, it’s not about God, but it is about the miracle of
whatever you need it to be: love, humanity, another person, whatever.” Wonsey
underlines that feel with a joyful, cascading piano solo, and the tune ends with
Margot harmonizing gorgeously with her multitracked self.
“Holding Back the Years,” a massive 1985 hit for Simply Red, is considerably
slower here and imbued with a stark, stunning intimacy. It’s first established in
the duet between Goods’s sinuous acoustic bass and Margot’s moody vocal, and
it persists long after Wonsey and Scott’s entrance—even with their opulent fills,
Margot seems direct, unadorned, confessional. The spell is broken only by Pelt’s
exquisite solo, sweet and laden with the earned wisdom of all those held-back
years and tears. Simplicity is the order of the day. Listen closely, though: For all
its bittersweet delicacy, a subtle, but nonetheless potent, rhythmic power underpins the track.
A very old, very well loved Cuban ballad by Cesar Portillo de la Luz, “Delirio”
is a favorite of Margot’s. In this beautiful version, it’s also a calculated risk.
“The thing about Spanish standards is that people are extremely fussy about
the way you sing them,” she says. There are rules, and they’re specific. People
care a lot about these standards and they’re very particular about staying true
to [them].” Pelt’s arrangement is simple enough, built on a cajon beat from
Scott and soft guitar from special guest Freddie Bryant; the trick is, Bryant
plays in a Brazilian style.
“Do What You Gotta Do,” written by Jimmy Webb, was recorded by several
artists—Nina Simone perhaps recording the best known version among them. The
one that compelled Margot to cover it, however, was Roberta Flack’s, lesser known
but captivating in its lonely vulnerability. Margot’s version is more vulnerable still.
It’s a setting for only herself and Wonsey, but unleashes an orchestra’s worth of
emotion: tenderness, sympathy, wistfulness, grief, and, ultimately, hope.
Just when it seems that the music couldn’t be pared down anymore, Margot delivers Joni Mitchell’s “Conversation” completely a cappella. She credits Pelt with the
idea, as a way both of presenting her vocal talents and of completing the full gamut
of textures on the album. But it works as a companion to the preceding track, both
being female, first-person confessionals. It’s also complementary to “Holding Back
the Years” in its intimate, laid-bare rumination—indeed, there’s a trace of echo on
her voice that suggests an internal monologue.
Portishead’s “It Could Be Sweet” stands out even from this eclectic set of songs.
It’s a chilly, haunting piece that (perhaps ironically) receives the fullest, densest
arrangement. Both Wonsey and special guest Roxy Coss contribute two layers of
sound, the former augmenting his watery Rhodes lead with faint synth, and the latter both improvising on soprano sax and providing an ostinato on bass clarinet. (It’s
the tune’s primary bass line, with Goods dancing hypnotically around it.) Margot’s
vocal delivery is passionate and authentic, yet also the extreme opposite of “Conversation”: opaque, detached, as if communicating across an unseen divide.
“What You Won’t Do for Love,” like “Do What You Gotta Do,” came to Margot from an unexpected source. “I was trolling for new music on YouTube when
I stumbled across this vintage David Letterman video, and there’s Phyllis Hyman
singing Bobby Caldwell’s song.” Caldwell and Hyman both gave the tune a smooth
soul reading. This version sounds like neither; it’s dark and mean. Goods’ electric
bass intro is so lowdown that it’s a bit threatening; Margot isn’t that, exactly, but
she does put a surprising sort of growl in her attack and doesn’t let up.
These eight songs have a common vibe running through them, in themselves
a full statement. But there’s an epilogue in two parts, giving the singer space to
work out in the straightahead jazz tradition. It begins with “Yesterday’s Blues,”
a soulful, down-to-basics duet with Richie Goods and the only composition on
the album that’s wholly Gillian Margot’s. “I said to Jeremy, ‘I kinda wanna do this
duet with Richie; let’s just do a blues.’ And Jeremy said, ‘Great! Write some lyrics!’
So I did, and Richie and I went into the studio and did a couple of takes. That’s all
that is, he and I just having some fun.” The only thing that speaks louder than that
spontaneous energy is Margot and Goods’ deep chemistry, which oozes forth from
every bar of the song.
Finally, there’s “I Wish I Were in Love Again,” the Rodgers and Hart tune
that’s Black Butterfly’s one true standard. This one fit with the rest of the album,
but they decided not to give it quite the same contemporary vibe. “We just said,
‘Let’s just do a jazz standard like a jazz standard!’” That they do: It has infectious
swing; bright, clean harmonies; and, most important, vivacity. Wonsey does his
part with a jaunty solo that seems to dance out of the speakers, but the excitement is really in Margot’s vocal: Quite simply, she sounds like she’s having a ball.
Black Butterfly was recorded in New York, rather than Margot’s native Toronto,
as the presence of so many American jazz musicians might indicate; the Canadian
singer is acutely conscious of it. “It’s very much an American record,” she says.
“And that’s cool. The sound that I want and the songs that I wanted were. And my
producer being American, and the particular players I wanted to create this particular sound were American. But between myself and Joni Mitchell’s composition,
I think we have our quota of Canadian content!”
Significantly, Black Butterfly is also Margot’s icebreaker for the American jazz
audience. She’s built an important career in Canada and internationally, which has
brought her to New York and other Stateside locales. But this is her calling card to
the larger musical audience, especially in the US.
And so, America and the world, meet Gillian Margot. She has a vision—and she
wants you to share in it.
Michael J. West is a jazz journalist in Washington, D.C.