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Nu Blaxploitation is an album by the American musician Don Byron, released in 1988.[3][4] Byron is credited with his band Existential Dred.[5] Byron supported the album with a North American tour.[6]

Nu Blaxploitation
Studio album by Don Byron
Released	1998
Genre	Funk, jazz, hip hop[1]
Label	Blue Note[2]
Producer	Don Byron
Don Byron chronology
Bug Music (1996) Nu Blaxploitation (1998) Romance with the Unseen (1999)

Production

The album was recorded in December 1997 and January 1998.[7] The poet Sadiq Bey performed on many of the tracks.[8] Biz Markie contributed rap verses to "Schizo Man".[5] Reggie Washington played bass; Uri Caine played piano.[9]

"Blinky" is about the abuse of Abner Louima by the NYPD.[10] "If 6 Was 9" is a cover of the Jimi Hendrix song; it contains a passage from the Turtles' "Happy Together".[11][12] Byron covered a couple of Mandrill songs; the band was one of Byron's childhood favorites.[13] "Dodi" references Dodi Fayed, while "Furman" references racist cop Mark Fuhrman.[14][15] "Domino Theories" was inspired by the work of political scientist Andrew Hacker.[7]

Critical reception

Professional ratings

Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic	[16]
Robert Christgau	[17]
The Encyclopedia of Popular Music	[18]
Los Angeles Daily News	[15]
The Penguin Guide to Jazz on CD	[7]

Time called the album "overtly political funk and rap" full of "dark, fertile electric grooves."[19] The Chicago Reader deemed it "an incisive collection of loose-limbed funk, acerbic spoken word."[10] Stereo Review considered Nu Blaxploitation "a mix of old-school groove, social protest, and surrealistic asides—just the kind of ambitious sprawl you'd expect from someone who dedicates his album to both Latin/funk purveyors Mandrill and classical composer Arnold Schoenberg (among others)."[20]

Jazziz wrote that the album "unfolds like a series of existential concerns set to a backbeat—a churlish, unapologetic bit of brilliance that vamps, grooves, strolls, and riffs on several levels at once."[21] Newsday labeled it "a one-of-a-kind testimony on what it's like to be a caring, daring African-American intellectual-bohemian at the tail end of the 20th Century."[22] The Washington Post stated that "Byron has writer Sadiq tiresomely spell out his points with words that recall the sophomoric scribblings of punk poet Henry Rollins."[23]

AllMusic praised the "somber, chamber jazz arrangements and a bevy of funky, swinging charts."[16]

Track listing

References

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