Matana Roberts is an artist whose work always, in one way or another, demands the listener's attention. Almost nothing that the experimental saxophonist releases is catered to what one might call a casual listen. Since The Chicago Project, which featured tracks that casually shifted between smooth melodic lines and more free and aggressive explorations, she has been slowly constructing a discography of quality avant-garde jazz albums. However, Roberts, like many greats before her in the long African-American tradition of improvisation and creativity, would likely scoff at the idea of categorizing her music as only "jazz". On Coin Coin Chapter Three: River Run Thee, she puts to bed any argument that the word "jazz" alone could be used to describe her latest ambitious series of albums.
On "Dreamer of Dreams", Roberts states that she "like[s] to tell stories". In a way, this simplistic statement could be used to describe her approach to what may end up being the defining project of her career, the Coin Coin series. The Coin Coin series, which Roberts has said is already all written and will span twelve chapters, is a musical journey through the history of the African-American people from the slave trade to the civil rights era. In interviews, Roberts has professed herself to be a lover of history and is particularly interested in the American history that she belongs to. The artist acknowledges the trauma it packs, but at the same time, professes her love of that history, as the fact that she is here now shows that her people are resilient survivors. The Coin Coin project is named after someone who her research has shown may be a distant relative by marriage - Marie Thérèse dite Coincoin. Coincoin, a former slave turned business woman and key figure in a 1700s Creole community of free people of color, was the main subject of Chapter One: Gens de couler libres.
With the release of Chapter One: Gens de couler libres' primal screams - from her voice and saxophone, Roberts found herself at the high end of many jazz and experimental year-end lists. Following that unflinching record with Coin Coin Chapter Two: Mississippi Moonchile's strikingly un-jazzy operatic vocals weaving around interesting six-piece ensemble interplay, she established herself as an artist who deserves keen attention in the modern avant-garde jazz scene. Taking all of this into account, the blatantly non-jazz, drone-filled-make-up of River Run Thee may have been a bit of a shock for Roberts' more jazz-based fans that were originally drawn to her with releases such as The Chicago Project and Live in London. Despite categorizing it as her favorite record in the Coin Coin series so far, she recognized in her Redbull Music Academy lecture that "some people really hated this record". Although it is clearly not for everyone, upon a close analysis, some listeners may find themselves getting lost in the dreary atmosphere of River Run Thee.
Roberts' grim creation is not an album that one can just pick up and put on shuffle, nor is it fit for the listener who tends to just skip around to their favorite tracks. What makes the project valuable and compelling is its brooding and unsettling experience as a whole. Although the LP is cut into twelve tracks, the work could probably best be described as a singular piece - a piece that is probably best enjoyed with headphones in solitude. Coincidentally, alone is how the album was conceived. Gone are the large groups of the past chapters, the lone performer being Roberts, who accompanies herself throughout the record. In the 46 minutes of River Run Thee, Roberts acts as a one-woman-band-source of a palpable, disquieting sense of dread.
Although this is the third chapter of Coin Coin, Roberts has said the if the project was being presented linearly, this album would be the first in the story. A few minutes into the opener, "All Is Written", the reason why is apparent as the lyrics here and album as a whole deals with the biggest grave of the slave trade - the sea - and the horrors that awaited those that survived it. The constant drones hit the listener like ominous and unforgiving waves of the ocean. Those that choose to submerge themselves into Roberts' world on River Run Thee should not expect to find happiness. Although the record avoids direct, detailed descriptions of things like corpses, bleak does not suffice to describe the images that are brought to mind by the mood the music and lyrics create. Due to the subject matter, at its essence, Chapter Three could be described as an album about some of the most cruel manifestations of humanity. Roberts' herself described it as a "fever dream" - and this dream evokes death.
Unlike the other Coin Coin albums, the sax is often not the center of attention. The forlorn cries of the instrument are mostly relegated to the background as her voice and waves of drone take the spotlight. The drones are at times the most present sonic-texture, an example being the heavier moments of "Come Away With Me". In "Clothed to the Land, Worn by the Sea", the lighter drones give the sensation of warped organs and in segments like "The Good Book Says", the darker drones juxtapose them to build a sense of tension. Despite the fact that its only Roberts here, this is a multi-layered record, with the saxophonist using overdubbing and gorgeous sound samples from her travels in the south, like the bells in "As Years Go By". The vocals often appear in collage like format with songs - perhaps better described as mini-movements - like "This Land Is Yours" and "Come Away" containing multiple Matanas talking, singing and playing sax. The latter track features her hauntingly whispering "doctor doctor I am very ill...master master I am very ill" below a grisly drone, before she breaks out into a weary mantra of "come away with me". With the lyrical content of the two lines, combined with Roberts' morbid tone, its easy to get the feeling the Roberts is asking the listener to come die with her - to come to the sea.
River Run Thee is a record that, in a literal sense, shuns away from screaming for the listener's attention. There are those who will view that as its weakness, but it can also be argued that the album contains a hypnotizing sinister environment that, when one is in the right mood, connects strongly upon repeated listens. Be it ghastly, choral like singing buried under layers of drone ("The Good Book Says"), pained lamentations that appear clearly in the front of the mix ("All Is Written") or eerie longing prayers set to excerpts from Captain G.L. Sullivan's slave-trade chronicle "Dhow Chasing in Zanzibar Waters" and her brilliant sax ("As Years Roll By"), the album never loses its tense atmosphere. Overall, River Run Thee is an immersive and menacing left-field project that will leave Roberts' fanbase wondering where she will take the next nine chapters of Coin Coin.
