Jacob Collier
★★★
Djesse Vol. 4
DECCA. CD/DL/LP
The last of jazz-pop chameleon’s album series.
The first British artist to win Grammys for his first four LPs, Collier sells truckloads of albums in the US, where he’s feted like a superstar, but in the UK, he’s still flying under the radar of mainstream adulation. Perhaps that’s because his grandiose musical vision, epitomised by Djesse, a quadruple-album project on an epic scale, resonates more with America’s ‘Dream Big’ mentality. Like the previous three Djesse LPs, the set’s denouement is the aural equivalent of a roller-coaster ride, its 21 tunes giddily flitting from R&B to South Asian music and even death metal. Impressive, too, is Collier’s enormous guest list (everyone from Stormzy to Steve Vai), which reads like a Who’s Who of pop. Though some will dismiss it as wildly overblown, even Collier’s harshest critics might grudgingly concede that as finales go, Djesse’s conclusion is breath-taking.