{"id":1575,"date":"2020-08-13T22:03:10","date_gmt":"2020-08-14T03:03:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/postgenre.org\/staging\/4567\/?p=1575"},"modified":"2021-06-24T17:04:45","modified_gmt":"2021-06-24T22:04:45","slug":"ackamoor-shaman","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/postgenre.org\/staging\/4567\/ackamoor-shaman\/","title":{"rendered":"Review: Idris Ackamoor & The Pyramids’ ‘Shaman!’"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

In the early 1990s, Allan Wilson and Rebecca Cann reached a scientific breakthrough in their testing of mitochondrial DNA. Their findings further supported the replacement hypothesis, a theory that proposes a single origin of man in a taxonomic sense. Its essential holding is that every human being descended from a small band of homo sapiens living in the sub-Saharan continent. Gradually, these groups spread further outward, ultimately settling most of the globe. While none of its members are paleoanthropologists by profession, one senses a similar thought is imbued in <\/em>Idris Ackamoor & The Pyramid\u2019s Shaman!<\/em> (Strut Records, 2020). <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In many ways, the San Francisco-based saxophonist\u2019s works have long espoused this perspective. In 1972, Ackamoor built upon lessons learned from his mentor, the great Cecil Taylor, to establish The Pyramids alongside flautist Dr. Margaux Simmons and electric bassist Kimathi Asante. After touring both Europe and Africa, they established residence in Ghana. Along the way, they picked up pieces of musical knowledge – and instruments – from every place they visited. Then found a way to fuse them into a singular approach to sound that would work towards removing the perception of any divide between pan-Africanism, spiritual jazz, R&B, funk, and the avant-garde. Self-releases, Lalibela <\/em>(1973),  King Of Kings <\/em>(1974), and Birth \/ Speed \/ Merging<\/em> (1976) explored the concept, increasingly more realized than the last. All three had very limited runs, being sold only at concerts out of the trunks of their cars. Despite the scarcity of finding their output, upon the ensemble\u2019s disbanding in 1977, many record collectors began hunting them down. By 2010, the collective reformed and issued their first studio album in over two decades. The passage of time served to allow its musicians – not precisely the same lineup as prior incarnations as it maintains an open-door policy – to further hone their skills and their approach. More followed, including the aptly titled We Be All Africans<\/em> (Strut Records, 2016). Shaman! <\/em>builds upon this approach while burning its own path in which the different components are not always so easily identifiable. 
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