Fireball

I don’t need jazz to be polite. If a record makes my feet move, I’m already halfway in.
That’s exactly what I get from John Ellis’s Double Wide project on Fireball. It’s big-hearted, loud in the right places, and built around celebration rather than reverence. The best description I’ve seen nails it: a confluence of New Orleans and Brazil, and “inciting feet into motion” from the first notes.

And it’s not cheesy. The trick is the band chemistry: the sousaphone-heavy foundation keeps it earthy. In contrast, the horns and keys keep it harmonically bright — like a brass-band mentality with modern-jazz decisions happening in real time.

What I also like is how this connects to the wider moment: the UK’s exploratory vanguard is openly described as blending jazz with dance music, hip-hop, Afrobeat and other disciplines. That tells me the “dancefloor jazz” lane isn’t a guilty pleasure anymore — it’s part of how modern jazz behaves.

If I’m choosing tracks for Jazz Matters, I trust my feet… and then I check the details later.