Kassa Overall is a Grammy-nominated musician, emcee, singer, producer, and drummer who melds avant-garde experimentation and hip-hop production techniques. He is taking the intersection of jazz and hip-hop into unchartered territories. At the beginning of his drumming career, Overall earned acclaim as the drummer with bandleaders like Geri Allen, Gary Bartz, Jon Batiste, and Vijay Iyer. His career progressed when he briefly joined Jon Batiste’s band on the Late Show with Stephen Colbert. Several imaginative and inspired records and mixtapes followed, and soon he was playing in Digable Planets. Kassa Overall’s new record entitled CREAM is a straight-ahead jazz record with rap and hip-hop DNA and no digital production. On it, Overall transforms rap anthems and hip-hop classics by The Notorious B.I.G., Wu-Tang Clan, Dr. Dre, A Tribe Called Quest, OutKast, Digable Planets, and Juvenile into rhythmically adventurous, witty, and sublime jazz performances. CREAM is not like any other melding of jazz and hip-hop that you have ever […]

October 2025 Issue