LP – Sure Fire Soul Ensemble – Gemini

1 LP – indie coloured vinyl

Recorded between late 2021 and early 2024 at The Kitchen II in their homebase of Lemon Grove, California, Sure Fire Soul Ensemble steer their “introspective party music” into fresh sonic realms.

While their breakbeat-heavy brand of funk-soul-jazz is still the cornerstone of their sound, they’ve begun to take more and more cues from library music labels such as KPM Music, spiritually-leaning jazz labels such as Tribe and Black Jazz Records, and exotica-adjacent jazz artists such as Cal Tjader and Dorothy Ashby.

Now leaning more into the “introspective” part of their sound, they evoke the spirits of Freddie Hubbard, Phil Ranelin, Wendell Harrison, Bubbha Thomas, Chester Thompson, and even Cannonball Adderley at his headiest and most cosmic. SFSE maintains their commitment to keeping it funky, but dares to go where they haven’t gone before and, as a result, breaks intriguing new ground in their overall sound.