SCI Fidelity

With a desire to collaborate more often Keller Williams has hooked up with a couple of fellow Virginia musicians on his 17th album. Rather than continue his hyperactive one-man band approach, he focuses solely on vocals and bass duties with the Transmitters’ Jay Starling (keyboards) and Mark D (drums) – known as Kdubalicious for this project – ably engaged in each song’s makeup. Rolling through reggae-funk territory, nearly half the tunes bear a strong kinship to Jamaica’s famous musical export while “Hey Ho Jorge,” and sultry covers of Morphine’s “Buena” and Beck’s “Hollywood Freeks,” where Keller offers his best Barry White-meets-Rick James vocal delivery, are simmering funk standouts.

Like much of Keller’s past work, the final result respects tradition but never wants to be boxed in by it. “High” deals with obvious subject matter but, overall, the lyrical territory concentrates on his ongoing inner monologue (i.e. “Super Hot” and “The Sun and the Moon’s Vangenda”). Musically, the album’s best moments occur when the threesome ignore genre, create a laidback groove and jam their way through it. The lengthy “Thinking Out Loud” does this the best, showing what the trio is capable of in a live situation. Although Keller’s current tour schedule doesn’t show more work with Starling and D, let’s hope that Bass isn’t the only time they get together.