As Gen-Z jazzers go, DOMi & JD Beck are leaders of a new hyper-hip yet virtuosic pack. French keyboardist DOMi Louna (aka Domitille Degalle, 22), and equally prodigious Dallas drummer JD Beck (aka James Dennis Beck, 19) have nearly 1.8 million followers across Instagram, TikTok, YouTube and Spotify and are no doubt exposing their massive young audience to a form of light-fingered jazz fusion alongside a ‘grazing’ diet of pop, rap and electronic music.

Their talent and these numbers are attracting some heavyweight guests too: who else could have Herbie Hancock, Kurt Rosenwinkel, Thundercat and three of the biggest names in rap, Snoop Dog, Busta Rhymes and Anderson. Paak (whose label is co-releasing this) on their debut album? And, of course, Blue Note has snapped them up as they seek to engage with a younger jazz audience too. So, what's all the fuss about? NOT TIGHT bristles with youthful energy but has a strange contemporary reserve that seems to be the hallmark of young players today: technique for days but not much feeling. If ‘meme jazz’ is a thing, then the album's earworm chord-melodies are typical examples.

‘WHATUP’ dances by like a 2022-take on ‘Giant Steps’ while ‘SMILE’ is two lopsided lo-fi looped sections decorated by Beck's beats and DOMi's undeniably catchy keys. Where the album scores musically is to fire up Thundercat on ‘Bowling’'s twisted vocal melody and to tear it up on some bass/keys fireworks on the album's complex electro-fusion title track. Herbie plugs in his vocoder for some chilled vox on ‘Moon’ (DOMi's Jaco-ish synth bass a nice retro touch), while guitar guru Kurt Rosenwinkel features on the album's deepest jazz cut, the aptly titled ‘Whoa’, shredding it up on yet more knotty Coltrane-style changes. Elsewhere, the rap and vocal contributions may lose older listener's interest and the very flat dynamics across the set (Beck's sound frequently emulates a drum machine), neuter this exciting duo's live energy and genuine chemistry.

The brainiac Gen-Z listeners will love it and maybe that's all that matters here.