visionary and Doris Duke Artist Award winner Kassa Overall unveils “C.R.E.A.M.

Today, GRAMMY-nominated jazz visionary and Doris Duke Artist Award winner Kassa Overall unveils “C.R.E.A.M. (CASH RULES EVERYTHING AROUND ME),” a Coltrane-esque exploration of Wu-Tang Clan’s rap anthem that dissolves the boundary between spiritual jazz and golden age hip-hop. The track is the second single off of his eponymously titled forthcoming album CREAM, out digitally and on CD and vinyl September 12 via Warp Records.

The single follows Overall’s first release from the project, “REBIRTH OF SLICK (COOL LIKE DAT)” (Digable Planets), which has already received praise from outlets including NPR’s All Songs Considered, The New York Times, TIDAL (‘Playlisters’ A-Listers’), KEXP, BBC6, Stereogum, The Needle Drop, Nate Chinen’s ‘The Gig,’ and many more. Overall also recently appeared in DownBeat Magazine’s ‘Rising Star’ critic polls, ranking high in both ‘Drummer of the Year’ and ‘Producer of the Year’ categories.

In his version of “C.R.E.A.M.,” Overall treats the seminal 1990s Wu-Tang production as a minor blues, inspired by classic Coltrane songs in 34 like “My Favorite Things.” Hypnotic and cinematic, the drummer and producer’s take on the song leaves you spinning in its powerful afterglow.

Of his affinity for the Wu-Tang Clan, Overall explains: “Their whole energy was an alternative to the get-the-money-shiny-suit mentality. For me, the original ‘C.R.E.A.M.’ was a commentary on ‘Get Money.’ It was realism. It pointed out everyone's scrambling and striving to get ahead, but it also nodded at something beyond that. You could transcend and even control the material world through a higher divine nature.”

Overall sees the transcendent message of the Wu-Tang Clan, John Coltrane’s spiritual pursuit of music, and his own praxis as fundamentally connected. “I heard stories of Trane’s band playing in clubs with eight people and they would be playing like their life depended on it, driven by the spirit and purpose of the music,” said the Seattle-based drummer. “People see us as entertainers, trying to be seen, trying to get money, but we are also trying to get to some deeper work.”

Performed by Overall and his band with no overdubs or edits, the song features Emilio Modeste on soprano sax, Matt Wong on keys, Bendji Allonce on percussion, and Jeremiah Kal’ab on bass.

Overall also announces new additions to their huge, 30 date world tour this fall, playing clubs and festivals all across the United States, Europe, and Asia with additional dates supporting Tune-Yards. For the full list of dates and tickets, visit his website here.

With CREAM, his fourth solo studio album, Overall pays homage to the twin passions of his youth — hip-hop and jazz drums in the tradition of Elvin Jones. Across 8 instrumentals, the visionary drummer and producer transforms hip-hop classics by The Notorious B.I.G., Wu-Tang Clan, Dr. Dre, A Tribe Called Quest, OutKast, Digable Planets, and Juvenile into timeless standards that are rhythmically adventurous, witty, and often sublime.

Dan Charnas, acclaimed author of Dilla Time, lays the scene in his liner notes for the record: “Enter Kassa Overall, with new notions. What if, instead of covering only the songs that it can easily see itself in, jazz mined a broader swath of hip-hop... for its rhythms, for its humor, for the clever way it frames its source material?...Kassa Overall’s album, ‘CREAM,’ perhaps the first of its kind, answers that question with jazz explorations of eight canonic hip-hop songs.”

The album was fueled by years of non-stop touring and the need to whittle down Overall’s elaborate electronic-driven stage setup in favor of something simpler. While his previous solo projects relied heavily on drum machines, micro-edited programmed sounds, Ableton Live, and samples, CREAM utilizes Rudy Van Gelder-style sound engineering in the vein of classic jazz recordings like Miles Davis’s Kind of Blue or John Coltrane’s A Love Supreme, with performances recorded in the same room with little separation, no overdubs, and no edits. Following now-canonical jazz interpretations of showtunes like John Coltrane’s cover of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s “My Favorite Things,” here Overall ironically reframes rap anthems to illustrate each song’s hidden rhythmic and harmonic potential.

“‘CREAM’ isn’t just covers—it’s a full-on reimagining of hip-hop through jazz, digging into the musical guts and soul of both.” Overall explains.

Reversing the convention of rap albums sampling jazz, Overall pulls off another backflip in a stunning career arc, illustrating his mastery as a producer, drummer and arranger who aggressively mines the continuum between jazz and hip-hop from every angle without any shortcuts.

About Kassa Overall:

Kassa Overall is a Grammy-nominated jazz artist, drummer, emcee, singer and producer. He seamlessly blends jazz, hip-hop and avant-garde experimentation into a sound uniquely his own. His music is both innovative and accessible, pushing the boundaries of genre while remaining deeply engaging. Overall has released six critically acclaimed mixtapes and albums, including I THINK I’M GOOD and Go Get Ice Cream and Listen to Jazz. His previous project, ANIMALS, explores the complexities of his identity as an artist and a Black man in America, featuring collaborations with an eclectic mix of musicians, from Danny Brown and Lil B to Nick Hakim and Vijay Iyer.

A graduate of the Oberlin Conservatory of Music, Overall has been a driving force in the jazz world for over two decades. In 2020, he was called “one of modern jazz music’s most audacious futurists” by Pitchfork. He has toured and recorded with renowned artists like Geri Allen, Jon Batiste, Steve Coleman, Vijay Iyer, Terri Lyne Carrington, and Gary Bartz, and his production work can be heard on albums by Theo Croker, Arto Lindsay and Danny Brown. A Seattle native, Kassa Overall attended Washington MS and Garfield HS. A child drum prodigy, he taught himself to make beats on an MPC and an ASR 10 he acquired at a Seattle Police Department auction