Indivisible Concurrence

• 1Sunrise On The Northside00:59
• 2Rebuild03:11
• 3Introductions00:48
• 4Groovin at the Del Morroco03:16
• 5Last Call At The New Era03:33
• 6A Dedication00:54
• 7I-40 Was A Razor05:48
• 8The Steering Committee Blues (Ain't Lying Down)01:46
• 9Diamonds Under Overpass02:29
• 10We Get Back Up01:56
• 11Now Is Still The Time06:52
• 12Talkin Bout The People02:54
• 13Who We Are00:23
• 14Night Cap At Brown's Dinner Club05:01
• 15Stay Black05:25
• 16What Could Have Been Still Can Be05:08
• 17A Study in Resistance02:42
• 18Bumpin' Thru Haynes02:42
• 19Black Music Is Forever01:29
• 20Don't Get Got (Head On A Swivel)02:19
• 21Abena02:39
• 22Indivisible03:19
• Total Runtime01:05:33

Info for Indivisible

Concurrence is a brotherhood of spirit and ideas reflected through music. Co-leaders keyboardist Paul Horton (touring member of Alabama Shakes) and electric bassist Greg Bryant challenge and inspire listeners through their earthy yet probing approach to composition and spontaneous exploration. Concurrence's debut, full-length release is "With Brotherhood" and features drummer Tommy Crane.

For more than two decades, bassist and broadcast host Greg Bryant and keyboardist and composer Paul Horton have worked together as Concurrence. Over that time they’ve specialized in making improvised music with an adventurous edge that’s arranged and performed in a manner that can simultaneously please both hardcore jazz fans and those whose tastes run to other genres. But their newest release Indivisible, a sprawling 22-track album out June 7 via Brooklyn indie La Reserve, is not only their boldest effort but also their finest musical statement.

In a joint interview, Horton and Bryant explain that Indivisible marks the first time Concurrence has made a concept album. Their subject: the havoc that the construction of America’s interstates wrought on Black communities, as I-40 did when it was built through North Nashville in the late 1960s.

“We’re secondary survivors and witnesses to this, Paul and I,” Bryant tells the Scene. “The Nashville I grew up in reflected the aftermath of I-40’s devastation on the Black community. I saw worship centers and nonprofit organizations that fought to thrive and survive. I saw Fisk University, Tennessee State University and Meharry Medical College still educating the best and brightest under enormous fiscal difficulties.”

Concurrence’s music — “from the head and from the heart,” as they describe it — is inspired by years of gigging along with research, digging in archives and speaking with historians. They aim to bring attention to the story of their own artistic home in North Nashville, with specific references to bygone clubs like the Del Morocco and one intense track called “I-40 Was a Razor,” but also wish to highlight similar cases all around the United States.

Recorded in sessions that began in October 2022, Indivisible also puts on full display the pair’s versatility and imagination, with collaborations that range across the spectrum of Black music. Elements of jazz, rock, blues, soul and pop seamlessly converge in the tracks, while the vocals and spoken-word passages detail the often ugly story of community displacement and turmoil caused by the highway project. The assembled cast of contributors and collaborators includes drummers and percussionists Nasheet Waits, Tommy Crane, Marcus Finnie, Derrek Phillips, Aaron Smith and Giovanni Rodriguez (who’s perhaps best known as a bassist with his band 12 Manos but has notable percussion credits as well). The roster also includes trumpeter Rod “Preacherman” McGaha, turntablist DJ Colonel Austin and saxophonist Reagan Mitchell, and there are vital contributions from vocalists and spoken-word artists Rashad tha Poet, Tracy P. Beard, Lo Naurel, Lloyd Buchanan and Dara Starr Tucker.

Concurrence

Concurrence
was founded by bassist Greg Bryant and pianist/producer Paul Horton in Nashville, Tennessee. Close friends since the early aughts, Greg and Paul have been active as a recording and performing ensemble since 2017. Concurrence released its debut full-length album, With Brotherhood, in 2017 with NYC's Tommy Crane on drums. In 2019, they released a self-titled EP and won Nashville Scene magazine's "Best Jazz Group" award. The following year, Greg moved to New York and Paul moved to Florida, but they are back together and performing to sold-out crowds at Rudy’s Jazz Room in Nashville .In June 2022, Concurrence released a three-song EP, Recollections, that was recorded safely during the pandemic and features frequent drummers and collaborators Derrek Phillips and Marcus Finnie.

Greg Bryant was born in Nashville, Tennessee, where he began his career as a musician, broadcaster and curator of jazz and improvisational music. He has performed or recorded with musicians such as Charlie Hunter, Rod McGaha, Dara Tucker, Nasheet Waits, Peter Bernstein, John Ellis and Jason Marsalis. Greg has produced and/or played bass on jazz vocalist and songwriter Dara Tucker's four albums. The most recent, Dreams of Waking: Music For a Better World, made it to #7 on the Jazzweek national radio charts. Paul is originally from Athens, Alabama. He has performed or recorded with musicians and singers such as Alabama Shakes, Brittany Howard, Prince, Georgia Ann Muldrow, Victor Goines, Nasheet Waits, Vicente Archer and Derrek Phillips. Paul's fusion of jazz, hip-hop, noise and ambient was exhibited on his most recent 2021 solo EP under his producer moniker "No.Stress." He also is a member of rock/soul vocalist Brittany Howard's touring and recording bands.

This album contains no booklet.