Public Sounds by Jakob Takos
The actual recording process for Public Sound’s debut album took months, but for the West Palm Beach-based brass band, creating an LP from scratch was almost six years in the making. Their efforts will show at the group’s upcoming release party for “Irregular Prime.”
Listening to “Funky See Funky Do,” the first single, it is evident that each band member is classically trained. It took cofounder Markis Hernandez years to find musicians with the discipline to perfect their playing and align their vision with his.
Hernandez, a flute and sax man and Port St. Lucie native, bounced around Broward and Palm Beach counties before studying music during a stint at Florida Atlantic University. After mostly playing covers with Chris Patsis on electric bass and Kevin Cripanuk on trombone and percussion, they decided it was time to start playing music they really loved. Other musicians from the region’s abundant talent pool have helped Hernandez find the right combination to create something special: They include Elijah Gee on keyboards and vocoder, Christian Davis on drums, and Trey Dark and Harley Galeano on drums.
The process in which the group was able to record its first LP is a testament to South Florida’s collaborative and supportive musical community: A mutual friend got the band into City of Progress, the Miami recording studio of Andrew Yeomanson, better known as DJ Le Spam; and Lorenzo Lindo of JM and the Sweets jumped in to mix the album after Hernandez reached out. Although rehearsals took quite a bit of time and perfection, Hernandez found each step of recording to be relatively smooth.
The album title comes from the complex time signatures used in many of the group’s songs, and these certainly make for catchy arrangements. Mixing brass band music with smooth jazz and funky keyboard riffs reminiscent of Chicago in the early 1970s, Public Sounds Collective have managed to unite jam band fans and jazz audiophiles. Count on the group will bring funk and flair to its hometown record release party to celebrate a worthy accomplishment.
Public Sounds perform 8pm Friday October 18 at Voltaire in West Palm Beach with special guests The Mona Lisa Tribe. publicsoundscollective .com ~ Olivia Feldman
