Synkronized is the fourth studio album by English funk and acid jazz band Jamiroquai. It was released on 8 June 1999 by Work Group in the United States, and on 14 June 1999 by S2 Records in the United Kingdom. Bassist Stuart Zender left the band during recording, and Nick Fyffe was hired as a replacement. The album contains funk, acid jazz and disco elements.
The album reached number one in the UK Albums Chart and number 28 in the US Billboard 200. The UK version of the album includes the bonus track "Deeper Underground", which was released as a single the previous year and became Jamiroquai's only number-one single in the UK.
Background
The album's recording sessions began at Jay Kay's Buckinghamshire home studio, Chillington, in 1998. About nine tracks were recorded, but the band's bassist, Stuart Zender, left partway through the recording in late 1998. Jay Kay hired a replacement, Nick Fyffe, who was originally looking to audition for a Jamiroquai tribute band, and the album was re-recorded. The revised album was finished and released within six months. Kay said that he was dissatisfied with Synkronized in a 2001 interview, "I never really locked into that album, lyrically. I wasn't there. I listen to it now, and I shake my head." The next track, "Black Capricorn Day", has a "driving funk groove with sassy horn interjections" which tend to "stutte[r] like a record on a turntable", with its lyrics about being depressed. The lyrics of the fourth track "Soul Education" is about having an "instinctive understanding of universal truths", as Kay confirmed in an interview with Muzik, "A soul education is what we're all born with, and the [song's] lyrics say, 'Life information – it's on the breeze.'"
"Falling" is a "bass driven" acid-jazz ballad track with its lyrics dedicated to Kay's then-girlfriend Denise Van Outen, The seventh track, "Supersonic", has a "didgeridoo and dobro drone against electronic percussion and a squiggling synth bass, all of which builds to an hallucinogenic mid-song samba break." The "breezy" track "Butterfly" has "a wobbly bassline that rises up and swamps the chorus." The album closes with "King for a Day", which has "dramatic piano and sympathetic strings", and lyrics referencing Zender's departure.
Release
Synkronized was first released on 8 June 1999 on the Work Group label in the United States, The album reached number 28 in the US Billboard 200, where it sold 310,000 shipments. It also ranked at number 4 in the UK. "Supersonic", released 13 September 1999, is the group's third US Dance Club number 1, also ranking at number 22 in the UK. "Black Capricorn Day" was released only in Japan on 3 November 1999. "King for a Day" is the last song to be released on 29 November 1999, where it peaked at number 20 in the UK.
Reception
The album received positive reviews from critics. According to John Bush of AllMusic: "Kay [continues his] fascination with club-bound music of the 1970s -- from disco to jazz-funk to rare groove to later Motown -- but also shows signs of maturity." Both critics have noted the band's new use of electronic textures. Troy Carpenter of Nude as the News called the track "King for a Day", "the band's best-ever album closer".
David Kendrick of Hartford Courant wrote that "Kay and Co. walk a tightrope between homage and derivation. They stay aloft with songs that are light and breezy", and that its lyrics "hold a carefree optimism". Prasad Bidaye of Exclaim! called the album, "Jamiroquai's most sophisticated production... The songs don't come anywhere close to the smooth balance of funk and environmentalism in their earlier material, but their philosophy of pre-millennial escapism makes this one of the most energetic recordings Jamiroquai has released in years." Edna Gundersen of USA Today wrote that "while the band's fourth album does boast a few jamming grooves, especially the brassy Black Capricorn Day, most of the tracks are to funk what Pop Tarts are to soul food." Writing for Las Vegas Review-Journal, Tom Moon wrote that "the liquid, slippery grooves are paramount, though they're sometimes buried under mountains of strings and arrangements that are a tad too busy." He also said that "Canned Heat" and several other tracks are "thinly veiled rewrites of 'Virtual Insanity' and the other radio songs from Traveling Without Moving." In his consumer guide for The Village Voice, critic Robert Christgau gave the album a C− rating in his annual "Turkey Shoot",
Track listing
Personnel
Credits for Synkronized adapted from album liner notes.
Jamiroquai
- Jay Kay – vocals, arrangements, string arrangements, producer, artwork concept
- Toby Smith – keyboards, keyboard programming (tracks 1–9)
- Derrick McKenzie – drums
- Nick Fyffe – bass
- Simon Katz – guitar (except track 1)
- Sola Akingbola – percussion
- Wallis Buchanan – didgeridoo
- DJ D-Zire – turntables
Additional musicians
- Erwin Keiles – guitar (track 1)
- John Thirkell – trumpet, flugel
- Katie Kissoon & Beverley Skeet – backing vocals
- Kick Horns – horns
- Simon Hale – string arrangements, keyboard programming (track 10)
Production
- Al Stone – producer, recording, mixing
- Paul Stoney – assistant engineering
- Mike Marsh – mastering
- David Malone – artwork concept
- Midori Tsukagoshi – photography
Charts
Weekly charts
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!Chart
!Position
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|European Albums Chart
|align="center"|1
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|Japanese Oricon Albums Chart
|align="center"|2
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Year-end charts
{| class="wikitable sortable" style="text-align:center;"
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!Chart (1999)
!Position
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|align="left"|Australian Albums Chart
|63
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|align="left"|Austrian Albums Chart
|42
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|align="left"|Belgian Albums Chart (Flanders)
|42
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|align="left"|Belgian Albums Chart (Wallonia)
|36
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|align="left"|Dutch Albums Chart
|50
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|align="left"|French Albums Chart
|30
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|align="left"|German Albums Chart
|23
|-
|align="left"|Japanese Albums Chart
|32
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|align="left"|Swiss Albums Chart
|25
|-
|}