With Eminem and The White Stripes still garnering press daily as leaders in the respective genres, it’s easy to overlook the countless other contributions Detroit has made to popular music: birth of Motown, birth of the Stooges & MC5, and birth of techno (stop laughing, my snobbish friend, there are good techno songs) just to name a few. The Detroit Experiment, a hybrid of jazz, funk, electronica and hip-hop, aims to show what happens when jazz legends are put alongside modern musicians, all under the direction of Carl Craig, one of the most respected and legendary DJs in electronica.

This is one of those albums that will confound critics and record store owners alike over how to categorize it. Stripped down to its essentials, it’s a jazz/electronica album, but calling it simply that would be downplaying the other diverse styles heard on each track. (For proof, these are the same people that brought you The Philadelphia Experiment, which brought together, ?uestlove of The Roots, jazz bassist Christian McBride, and pianist Uri Caine.)

So I’m on listen 8 or 9 right now and, dammit, I still don’t know how to describe this album, which in this case is a very good thing. I thought I had it for a second, but then Stevie Wonder’s "Too High" was reworked as a jazzyfunkyspaceykindatechno song and damn, I’m right back to square one. OK, how about a comparison? What if Guru’s Jazzmatazz decreased its hip-hop factor and added heavy doses of electronica to the mix? Now we’re getting somewhere.

Another comparison? (As is the job of music journalist.) Ropeadope calls this "Miles Davis jamming with Radiohead and A Tribe Called Quest." While seemingly far-fetched, that’s actually not a bad description, but it is descriptions like these that may sadly turn away people who dismiss anything jazz-related as banal and mundane. Oh well. Their loss. The Detroit Experiment is a rare album that rewards music fans with diverse tastes. The question with albums like these is always: are there enough people out there willing to take the chance? Those that do will not be disappointed.

Jason Newman