Grammy-nominated drummer, vocalist and producer Kassa Overall is bringing his approach full circle with a performance at The Dakota on Wednesday night. Some of Overall’s earliest professional experiences were traveling with Geri Allen, Wallace Roney and others in very formal jazz bandstand settings. On Wednesday, Overall will bring all the enthusiasm and adventurousness that he’s known for into a seated nightclub performance. Kassa Overall will also be premiering some new sounds that will be part of his next release and will be joined by the celebrated musician, and recent Twin Cities transplant, Melvin Gibbs.
This interview originally aired on The Afternoon Cruise on 04/14/25
READ THE COMPLETE TRANSCRIPT BELOW:
Sean McPherson (Jazz88)
It’s the afternoon cruise. I’m chatting with Kassa Overall. Overall is a Grammy nominated producer, songwriter, MC and drummer, coming back through town this time for a show at the Dakota on Wednesday night. That’s April 16. Kassa, thank you for connecting with jazz 88 and thanks for bringing the crew back through town.
Kassa Overall
Hey man, thanks for having me. Always glad to be here. Always good to rap with you.
Sean McPherson (Jazz88)
Now, cost the last time I saw you in person, you were actually out on the road, both with your own group and also performing with Digable planets, playing drums with them. How was that experience for you, and how has that informed the music you’re making when you’re not with Diggable planets?
Kassa Overall
That’s actually a really good question, because when I think about it. It did inform the music I’m making now. A lot the experience touring with Digable was very intense. I was driving in a minivan or in a Chevy Express passenger van with my band, state to state, city to city, carrying instruments and merch. And so I did two sound checks, my sound check, and a sound check with Digable, two shows and two merch booth party times, you know? And then so it was like one of the most intense musical experiences I ever had. And I remember talking to Ishmael Butler, aka Butterfly. And I was telling him, like, Man, I don’t know. Man, I don’t know if I can. And he was like, you know, this will just get you to a new level of, like, a new zero, you know, like this. This will get you you can handle this, then, you know, you can handle this, you know. And I was like, okay, so it was, it was great, man. It was a lot of fun, and very tough, and some of the most fun times. And now I have this new project that I’m working on, or, you know, it’s in the can, but that we’re we’re getting all prepped, and we’ll be performing some of that music in Minneapolis at the Dakota and the songs we’re doing are like covers the 90s, hip hop joints, 90s early, 2000s but we’re flipping them not like, just like a smooth jazz version, but We’re flipping them like, into very creative, weird, abstract, improvisational vehicles. So a lot of that was inspired by kicking it with Digable and just getting in that that hit, that hip hop, like that golden era feel, you know. So, yeah.
Sean McPherson (Jazz88)
I’m chatting with Kassa Overall, the man is a renaissance man, to be sure, doing all sorts of stuff, and I couldn’t imagine somebody more well suited to pull out some of that golden era Hip Hop samples and explore and add to that. Now I want to ask who you’re bringing with you on this run of shows, which, for us, matters, because you’re at the Dakota on Wednesday.
Kassa Overall
So I’ m bringing Bendji Allonce on percussion. He’s He’s a Haitian American conga player, percussionist. He’s been with me for a while. Matt Wong on keys. He plays keys. And he’s also a composer, arranger. He does a lot of work with John Batiste. He did a lot of work on American Symphony, which ended up on that Netflix documentary. So, like, he’s like, he’s like, our Wiz Kid. And then Emilio Modeste is on sax for this one. And Emilio, I know him through the the Wallace Roney, Antoine Roney connection. You know, some people know that some of my earliest experiences touring was with Geri, Geri Allen, who was with Wallace Roney at the time, and so that whole crew really turned out some amazing young musicians and really deep rooted in the tradition, but also thinking about innovation. So Emilio is going to be with me on this. He’s playing sax, ewi, little bit of drums. You know, I always try to get everybody to play everything on stage. So we’ll be doing our thing, man. And oh, also Melvin Gibbs, oh, living in Minneapolis, right. Yeah, Melvin Gibbs is going to be our featured artist. So we’ll play a couple, then we’ll bring Melvin up, and then all bets are off.
Sean McPherson (Jazz88)
I was at a birthday party for a mutual friend, and Melvin Gibbs looked me in the face and said, One day we got to get together and talk bass. And I was like, well, that’s, that’s the highlight of my. I, you know, like, I can’t wait to actually do it, but that’s so cool that I’ll be out there with you. And a lot of folks don’t know that this very iconic musician, primarily a bass player, but much more than that, has been making his residence in the Twin Cities for like, I think, two, three plus years now. So very, very cool that you’re connecting with them.
Kassa Overall
Yes, I originally met him playing, playing and producing and recording with art o Lindsey, so we toured Europe, Brazil, US, and yeah, Melvin, he’s like a mentor, and he’s got a he’s got a book coming out soon. He’s been doing this whole like rhythm, DNA science research kind of thing. So yeah, I look forward to connecting with him. And, um, yeah, excited.
Sean McPherson (Jazz88)
I’m chatting with Kasa Overall, he’s playing the Dakota on Wednesday night. Kassa, you mentioned that you try to get a lot of your musicians to share different instrumental roles, and that also dovetails into the fact that your show is like, significantly more fun than a lot of jazz sets. I love jazz sets, but you don’t do the like after the third song, you walk up and say, Thank you. Thank you much gratitude. And those previous two cuts were this, and it’s they’re sort of like a very routinized side of it. You keep it fun. I wanted to ask you, when you’re in a sort of real story jazz club setting a spot like the Dakota, is it still easy for you to create your own fun environment and sort of run things the Kasa Overall way, not the cookie cutter jazz show way? Yeah.
Kassa Overall
I mean, the thing is that, um, that’s where I came up. You know, my first experiences as a professional was the jazz clubs, jazz festivals, and we’re talking about early, you know, 2007 2008 so really, like, you know, you might have on a suit coat, etcetera, etcetera. So that was really how I got comfortable. So unlike even some of the people in my band are not as comfortable like if they see a room full of people seated, you know, at tables or in a concert hall. They might not know how to engage with them the same kind of way. But for me, that’s really where I started. So when I was playing gigs at like the Zinc bar or Smalls or these clubs in New York, I was doing the same thing, you know, I was trying to bring vocal pedals and click tracks and talking my stuff and having fun and people. People were like, especially like jazz community homies. People were like, laughing at me at first, kind of like, Yo, what’s this guy doing? But, but they didn’t understand it. Like I was trying to develop something out of that space. So that’s actually the perfect place to do it, because it’s, it’s ironic, you know what? I mean, it’s not like. And the thing is that it’s the only way I know how to be, you know, if I tried to go up there and be, you know, well, that that last number was composed by the, you know, I just wouldn’t even know how to do it like I tried. I can’t do that. So it’s always gonna be what it is, because it is what it is, you know, it’s just, that’s just the way we flow. And one more little thing I want to add to that is that this new project that I’m that I’m getting ready to, I’m not announcing a new project, but I’m announcing a new project. So the thing that we’re getting to is, this is the most jazz record, record that I’ve worked on. You know, we’re recording in one room. We’re researching Rudy van Gelder recording techniques, and we’re trying to, there’s no edits. It’s all literally takes with bands. So this is the most jazz record record, but I’m doing it as a means to be in conversation with that style. So I want people to understand that, like what it’s rooted in, and also like my take on it. So we might, we might pretend to be serious, but if we do, it’s just to set you up for a bigger punchline.
Sean McPherson (Jazz88)
I’m chatting with Kassa Overall the shows on Wednesday at the Dakota. Kassa is coming to town, but right now he’s hanging at the gym, so we got to ask, like, what’s the strategy, cardio, weight, lifting. What’s the order of operations? If I how do I get in shape? Like Kassa Overall In shape?
Kassa Overall
Oh my god, bro. If you want to, if you want to open that up, we need, like, a two hour podcast scenario to really go there. But I’ll tell you. So first off, I’m not in that great shape, because, as some people know, as you may know, I have a 10 month old son, it’s like, I don’t have the time to just be right, that narcissistic, but I do get in there, as you know, as much as I can, we get a couple hours of daycare from the gym. So that’s like, we can lean on that. And basically, man, I like to lift weights. I do a push. Pull technique. That means I’m doing bench press, shoulder press, leg press, all the push things, and then the next day I’m coming in, I’m doing pull ups, lat pulls, leg curls, etc, etc. You know, I might be taking a little creatine, muscle milk, trying to stay away from the bread, but I had about three croissants yesterday, so that’s where we’re at.
Sean McPherson (Jazz88)
All right, three croissants, a little creatine, and I’ll skip all the rest of it. I should be all good. Congratulations to you and your partner on the child. That’s a beautiful thing, and I’m so glad you get a little chance to still, you know, do some things outside of parenting, because, yes, it is an uphill battle to take care of your own self while taking care of a newborn. So I tip my hat to you on that, and I’m also glad you’re still able to get out of town. Kassa Overall on the stage of the Dakota on Wednesday night. Kassa, thank you so much for chatting with jazz 88 man.
Kassa Overall
Thank you gratitude. Thank you to you the station and every all the listeners you know. Get your tickets, come through. We can have a good time one night only.
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