Description
Produced in collaboration with Berlin-based duo Re.decay, DJ Amir presents a brand new remix of Strata Records founder Kenny Cox’s track ‘Lost My Love’, taken from his long- forgotten mid 70’s album ‘Clap Clap! The Joyful Noise’.
Originally planned to be the second release on Detroit’s mythic Strata label (a precursor to its more famous cousin Strata East), pianist Kenny Cox’s first and only solo album came hot on the heels of The Lyman Woodard Organization’s classic ‘Saturday Night Special’. But, for reasons lost to the mists of time, the LP never saw the light of day until DJ Amir licensed the rights to the label’s catalogue and began scouring the archive in 2012, rediscovering ‘Clap Clap! The Joyful Noise’ and issuing it on his own 180 Proof imprint.
The closing track from ‘Clap Clap! The Joyful Noise’, ‘Lost My Love’ is a bossa-tinged, flute and mellotron string-laden, languid jazz-fusion gem, with Kenny Cox’s delicate electric piano chords at its warm centre. DJ Amir joins forces with Berlin production duo Re.decay for a complete rebuild of the track from the original master stems. Their version retains the cosy, analogue atmospherics of Cox’s original, complete with piano licks and flute trills, adding unhurried jazzy disco drums and drawing out the song’s subtly sleazy bass-line.
Serving as pianist for Etta Jones and recording for Blue Note records with his Contemporary Jazz Quintet, Kenny Cox founded the Strata label in the early 70’s, a natural progression from the Strata Concert Gallery which he opened in the late 60s, a tiny artist-led performance space that played host to jazz luminaries such as Ornette Coleman, Herbie Hancock and even Charles Mingus (a live recording of whose appearance at the Gallery was issued by BBE Music in 2018). He passed away at his Detroit home in 2008, survived by his widow, Barbara Cox.