Acid jazz is a
musical genre that combines elements of
jazz,
funk and
hip-hop[1], particularly
looped beats. It developed in the UK over the 1980s and 1990s and could be seen as tacking the sound of
jazz-funk onto
electronic dance/
pop music jazz-funk musicians such as
Roy Ayers and
Donald Byrd are often credited as forerunners of acid jazz.
[2] Acid jazz has also experienced minor influences from
soul music,
house music and
disco.
While acid jazz often contains various types of electronic composition (sometimes including sampling or live DJ cutting and scratching), it is just as likely to be played live by musicians, who often showcase jazz interpretation as part of their performance. The compositions of groups such as Jamiroquai, The Brand New Heavies and Incognito often feature chord structures usually associated with jazz music. The Heavies in particular were known in their early years for beginning their songs as catchy pop and rapidly steering them into jazz territory before "resolving" the composition and thus not losing any pop listeners but successfully "exposing" them to jazz elements in "baby steps".
The acid jazz "movement" is also seen as a "revival" of jazz-funk or jazz fusion or soul jazz by leading DJs such as Norman Jay or Gilles Peterson or Patrick Forge, also known as "rare groove crate diggers" or "Cataroos".
The sound and clubs that went with it arose out of Southern England's rare groove scene of the late seventies and early eighties and various other alternative groups, including the London mod scene. It is distinguished from the Northern Soul scene (then popular in the South of England with clubs such as the 100 Club in Oxford Street) but still portrayed various similarities.
