The fluctuating divide between soul and jazz has become more blurred than ever, as this young American singer first attested on his acclaimed 2021 debut, Bones – a set with a foot in both genres and a backdrop of multivocal effects (a possible result of ingesting too much Pet Sounds at college). This follow-up tilts sharply towards jazz and emerges the better for doing so. Self-produced this time, its sound is cleaner, its mood lighter, its material a happy mix of originals and jazz standards.
Classically trained, with musician parents – mother a go-to backing singer, father a member of Earth Wind & Fire – Mayo has brought in an inventive trio of Shai Maestro (keys), Linda May Han Oh (bass) and Nate Smith (drums). They shimmer as he scats airily on Frenzy, get funky on the title cut (with help from Mayo’s parents), and deliver classic accents for It Could Happen to You and Spring Can Really Hang You Up the Most, on which Mayo gives a discreet nod to Chet Baker (soft, sensuous and a tiny bit flat). He wraps things up with a rap-cum-scat on Miles Davis’s Four, and a bravura two-minute version of Wayne Shorter’s Speak No Evil. Great entertainment.
