Following up on his hit 2013 debut album, 3ChordFold, Terrace Martin has released another masterpiece in production—3ChordFold Pulse. Coming from a household full of music, Terrace first picked up a saxophone at age 13. Under the tutelage of the highly touted L.A. music educator Reggie Andrews and landing gigs with the likes of Puff Daddy and Snoop Dogg as early as age 17, Terrace Martin has long been no stranger to musical greatness. Highly influenced by legendary artists like Anita Baker, Luther Vandross, Michael Jackson, and John Coltrane, jazz, soul and R&B are thickly laced throughout Terrace’s genius production. While most may know Terrace Martin from his production of tracks like “Real” and “m.A.A.d city” on Kendrick Lamar’s good kid, m.A.A.d city album, 3ChordFold and now 3ChordFold Pulse stand alone as musical monuments in their own rights.
A big difference between this release and previous releases (barring his instrumental tapes) is a distinct focus on production. Terrace Martin steps aside this album and allows the vocals to be served up by features that include Snoop Dogg, Wyann Vaughn, and Teedra Moses.
As stated in the very first song, “Pulse”, “Music consists of melody, rhythm, and harmony,” and Terrace proceeds to present a project that distinctly combines all three aspects of music throughout. Right from the start Terrace jams out with his sax above a beat whose foundation is a simple beat-boxing sequence and the beautiful sing-song voice of the featured Preston Harris. This laid-back tone appropriately sets the milieu for the rest of the album.
The next song featuring Preston Harris, “You and Me,” is a dangerous one: dangerous in the sense that you cannot play this song when your girl is around. If you do, you might fall in love with this girl, and the next thing you know you are driving a bland green Dodge Caravan filled with five kids and a wife screaming at you about some sort of mortgage payments and how you have to take your son to some YMCA league on Saturday that you didn’t even know existed. Honestly, this song might be too divine for your ears.
Don’t worry though, because the very next song Terrace leaps into the more youthful subject of getting baked. “Let’s Go Get Stoned” isn’t just your typical weed song you’ve heard time and again though, even if the biggest stoner in the world, Snoop Dogg, is on the mic. Along with R&B singer Tone Trezure, Snoop and Terrace create a Blues song with that laidback vibe consistent with the rest of the album, but with whiny instrumentals reminiscent of B.B. King. I wouldn’t say this is Snoop Dogg’s best sound, but you can’t be too picky with the guy who has been coming out with music for over two decades.
One of the crown jewels on this album for hip-hop heads has got to be the Live version Kendrick’s “Poetic Justice.” Performing from New York, Terrace’s featured saxophone act is nearly as prominent as Kendrick’s verse. They, “know just, know just, know just, know just, know just what we want,” because this remix makes this hit single into a whole new animal. I don’t know what it is about that damn saxophone Terrace plays, but it’s like he took the three minute “Poetic Justice” and morphed it into a 500 page Homer’s Odyssey.
A personal favorite on the album is “Angel” where 9th Wonder collaborates with Terrace to produce a soul-sampling, springtime walk through the park. Having worked together on numerous projects before Angel, 9th Wonder and Terrace have an indubitable chemistry together. It’s as if L.A. and North Carolina weren’t separated by an entire continent. This is definitely one of my favorite tracks not only on 3Chordfold Pulse but also one of my favorite Terrace Martin tracks of all time.
Next, listeners hear Snoop Dogg jump on the track again in “Never Have to Worry” live in New York. Snoop Dogg delves into nostalgia bringing us back to a day long, long ago when his classic single “Deep Cover” was released with Dr. Dre. in 1992. He wonders in amazement how he got to the point he is at now, never having to worry about his gangster past anymore. Snoop slowly shares the timeline of his riveting career and is bookended with a powerful saxophone outro. Between being a huge fan of the classic Snoop Dogg and hearing the ear-melting sax outro, if I were in the crowd I probably would have gone insane.
The final track worth explicit mentioning is “Butterfly”. If you don’t listen to any other track on this release, I implore you to listen to this. Logging nearly 40 minutes of live performance, this may be the single greatest live experiment ever released. Filled with phenomenal musicians including legendary bassist Ethan Farmer, keyboardist Craig Brockman, the immortal Marley Marl, and Grammy award winners drummer Ronald Bruner, Jr. and pianist/ record producer Robert Glasper, this song was destined to be great from the start. When listening, it feels like a wild, bumpy ride through a psychedelic ocean of notes, no peak or valley disappointing. I imagine this is the music you would hear in your head if you found out that you just won the Powerball in the middle of a skydiving journey from outer space. Don’t be a lazy music fan- Listen.To.This.Track.
The only reservation I have with 3Chordfold Pulse as a project is its lack of continuity among the tracks. Though there is a thread that does tie these songs together, the thread is too strand-like for my taste. This is definitely just more of a disparate collection of great songs than it is a great album with songs that seamlessly mesh. I am someone who values the finished product of the album as a whole far more than each track individually so this was a disappointment to me. Of course, I imagine this is what Terrace Martin had in mind when he released this 3Chordfold accompaniment so this reservation is essentially a given.
Overall, this is an album that fans of just about every genre can enjoy. Terrace Martin just creates pure music that transcends rigid placement into a specific genre. This is a must-listen and fires me up for his next release. If there is anything to be gathered from 3Chordfold Pulse, this guy Terrace Martin is here to stick around and you can rest assured that the great music will keep coming.
