Review: Jerk - as day breaks / as night falls (DeepMatter Records)

Jerk's 'As Night Falls' EP now has an 'answer' EP, obviously, 'As Day Breaks' as Brookyn opens the worlds eyes to "jazz fusion meets Bob James' hip-hop off-spring". 

Composer/producer/multi-instrumentalist Jerk wakes up with eight more tracks influenced by Dilla/Madlib beats as much as Thundercat / Bob James jazz-fusion-funk-OST.

Once again Jerk (aka Joshua Kinney) is joined by Martin Wade (drums) and Wyatt Rydlewski (bass), and after 'alarmed', 'as long as I breathe' (don't you just love these early morning titles), 'lean in' kicks off our day and if you pick flowers at the speed of 'picking flowers' the Dutch growers will want you at a pace.

There's some interesting times patterns going on here that's a little unsettling as they say, "This joint album project is the essence of Jerk — neither day nor night, but something more ethereal" that tracks like 'putting it back together' and 'steppin' out' mix the funk and nu-jazz in different moods of light and shade; perhaps even dark.

You can easily imagine this is the type of thing that he dreams about like 'still dreaming' and 'wait', the latter labelled by Jerk himself as 'son-tra' (being abrev - 'sonic mantra') as you think James, Rushen, Dilla et al fusion.

I think we can forgive him that one as, like the 'As Night Falls' set (see review HERE), don't be surprised to hear that any of these tracks have slipping onto a soundtrack or advert soon as; particuarly 'lean in' as it's so reminiscent of and unique at the same.  No wonder he's made the playlists of Somewhere Soul and DJs including Huey Morgan on BBC 6 Music, Tony Minvielle and John Osborne on Jazz FM, Papaoul and Tom Ravenscroft on Rinse FM, and more.

BUY LINK / PRE-ORDER: as day breaks | Jerk

Artist: Jerk
Title:   As Day Breaks / As Night Falls EP 

Release date: 15th May, 2026

Label : DeepMatter Records

Catalog Number : TBC

Format: Double EP Vinyl /  Digital / Bandcamp