A Funk Odyssey is the fifth studio album by British acid jazz band Jamiroquai

Jamiroquai

Jamiroquai is a British jazz funk and acid jazz band formed in 1992. Jamiroquai were initially the most prominent component in the early-1990s London-based acid jazz movement, alongside groups such as Incognito, the James Taylor Quartet, and the Brand New Heavies. Other Acid Jazz artists such as...

, released on 3 September 2001 in the United Kingdom

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

, and 11 September 2001 in the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

.

Background

Combining features of disco

Disco

Disco is a genre of dance music. Disco acts charted high during the mid-1970s, and the genre's popularity peaked during the late 1970s. It had its roots in clubs that catered to African American, gay, psychedelic, and other communities in New York City and Philadelphia during the late 1960s and...

, funk

Funk

Funk is a music genre that originated in the mid-late 1960s when African American musicians blended soul music, jazz and R&B into a rhythmic, danceable new form of music. Funk de-emphasizes melody and harmony and brings a strong rhythmic groove of electric bass and drums to the foreground...

 and electronica

Electronica

Electronica includes a wide range of contemporary electronic music designed for a wide range of uses, including foreground listening, some forms of dancing, and background music for other activities; however, unlike electronic dance music, it is not specifically made for dancing...

, the release of the album represented the peak of international commercial success for Jamiroquai, and in the ensuing world tour the group became a household name in many countries. The sleeve art of A Funk Odyssey features Jay Kay posed in front of a series of lasers that form the famous "Buffalo Man" logo, making it the first Jamiroquai album not to feature the logo prominently on its cover. The album marks a departure from the band's previous acid jazz sound; the band finds themselves in a disco funk vibe, and is also very focused on an electronica

Electronica

Electronica includes a wide range of contemporary electronic music designed for a wide range of uses, including foreground listening, some forms of dancing, and background music for other activities; however, unlike electronic dance music, it is not specifically made for dancing...

 sound, evident especially in "Twenty Zero One" and "Stop Don't Panic". A popular fan interpretation is that "Main Vein" is a song written about Denise van Outen

Denise van Outen

Denise van Outen is an English actress, singer and television presenter. Her most notable roles to date are as a presenter on The Big Breakfast, and as Roxie Hart in the musical Chicago on both the West End and on Broadway.- Early life :Born Denise Kathleen Outen in Basildon, Essex, she is the...

, Jay's ex-girlfriend, but from her perspective; the song would have thus featured a female vocalist and would showcase the same fight shown in "Little L" but from Denise's perspective. A test pressing of the album features an instrumental of "Main Vein", which supports this theory.

Reception

Initial critical response to A Funk Odyssey was generally mixed. At Metacritic

Metacritic

Metacritic.com is a website that collates reviews of music albums, games, movies, TV shows and DVDs. For each product, a numerical score from each review is obtained and the total is averaged. An excerpt of each review is provided along with a hyperlink to the source. Three colour codes of Green,...

, which assigns a normalized

Standard score

In statistics, a standard score indicates how many standard deviations an observation or datum is above or below the mean. It is a dimensionless quantity derived by subtracting the population mean from an individual raw score and then dividing the difference by the population standard deviation...

 rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the album has received an average

Weighted mean

The weighted mean is similar to an arithmetic mean , where instead of each of the data points contributing equally to the final average, some data points contribute more than others...

 score of 58, based on 13 reviews. Q magazine gave the album 4 out of 5 stars, claiming "A certified thoroughbred. This time, there's a bankable chorus or barbed sentiment for every mirror-ball moment....demonstrating that no-one does sci-fi boogie quite as well as he does sci-fi boogie." CMJ described the album as "The perfect mixtape to snap your fingers to on your way to another universe."

Tracklisting

1. "Feel So Good" – 5:21 (Kay, Smith)
2. "Little L
   Little L
   "Little L" is the lead single from British Acid Jazz band Jamiroquai's fifth studio album, A Funk Odyssey. The song was written by Jay Kay, and was inspired by the breakup between himself and Denise van Outen, his former girlfriend, over his cocaine problem. The song was featured in the film The...
   
   " – 4:55 (Kay, Smith)
3. "You Give Me Something
   You Give Me Something (Jamiroquai song)
   "You Give Me Something" is the second single from British Acid Jazz band Jamiroquai's fifth studio album, A Funk Odyssey. The song was written by Jason Kay. The song peaked at #16 on the UK Singles Chart. The song is inspired by disco and funk theme, as implied by the album's title itself, A Funk...
   
   " – 3:23 (Kay, Harris, Fyffe)
4. "Corner of the Earth
   Corner of the Earth
   "Corner of the Earth" is the fourth and final single from British acid jazz band Jamiroquai's fifth studio album, A Funk Odyssey. The song was written by Jason Kay and is a bossa nova-type track, reflecting on the problems that people of the Earth have to suffer. The song peaked at #31 on the UK...
   
   " – 5:40 (Kay, Harris)
5. "Love Foolosophy
   Love Foolosophy
   "Love Foolosophy" is the third single from British Acid Jazz band Jamiroquai's fifth studio album, A Funk Odyssey. The song was written by Jason Kay. The song's title is a play on words, using a makeshift homonym for "Philosophy" to imply that the singer is a fool for love, as it were. The song...
   
   " – 3:45 (Kay, Smith)
6. "Stop Don't Panic" – 4:34 (Kay, Harris, Fyffe)
7. "Black Crow" – 4:02 (Kay, Harris, Fyffe)
8. "Main Vein" – 5:05 (Kay)
9. "Twenty Zero One" – 5:15 (Kay)
10. "Picture Of My Life" – 4:11 (Kay, Harris, Smith)
11. "So Good To Feel Real" (Hidden Track) – 2:04

• Japanese Bonus Tracks

12. "Do It Like We Used To Do" - 6:49

13. "Deeper Underground" - 4:44

• Australian Bonus Disc

1. "Do It Like We Used To Do" - 6:49
2. "Everybody's Going To The Moon" - 5:22
3. "Little L" (Video)

• Australian Tour Edition Bonus Disc

1. "Space Cowboy" (Classic Club Mix) - 7:52
2. "Supersonic" (Dirty Rotten Scoundrels Vocal) - 7:00
3. "Deeper Underground" - 4:44
4. "Little L" (Bob Sinclair Remix) - 7:28
5. "You Give Me Something" (Full Intention Remix) - 3:03
6. "Main Vein" (Live) - 5:14

• Asian Tour Edition Bonus Disc

1. "Everybody's Going To The Moon" - 5:22
2. "Do It Like We Used To Do" - 6:49
3. "Deeper Underground" - 4:44
4. "Little L" (Bob Sinclair Remix) - 7:28
5. "You Give Me Something" (Full Intention Remix) - 3:03
6. "Main Vein" (Live) - 5:14

• South African Tour Edition Bonus Disc

1. "Main Vein" (Live) - 5:14
2. "Do It Like We Used To Do" - 6:49
3. "You Give Me Something" (Full Intention Remix) - 3:03
4. "Little L" (Blaze Remix) - 5:55
5. "Love Foolosophy" (Mondo Grosso Love Acoustic Version) - 4:44
6. "Corner Of The Earth" (Milk & Sugar Short Club Mix) - 4:13

• French Tour Edition Bonus Disc

1. "Everybody's Going To The Moon" - 5:22
2. "Do It Like We Used To Do" - 6:49
3. "Main Vein" (Live) - 5:14
4. "Titan" (Live At Telewest Arena) - 3:15
5. "Feels So Good" (Knee Deep Vocal Dub) - 7:34
6. "Love Foolosophy" (Mondo Grosso Love Acoustic Version) - 4:44

• Original Test Pressing

1. "Feel So Good" (Uncut) – 6:24
2. "Little L" (Extra Percussion) – 4:55
3. "You Give Me Something" (Uncut) – 5:16
4. "Interlude #1" – 0:35
5. "Main Vein" (No Vocals – Cut) – 4:51
6. "Corner Of The Earth" (Vocal Variation) – 5:40
7. "Twenty Zero One" (Uncut) – 8:29
8. "Black Crow" (Vocal Variation) – 4:02
9. "Interlude #2" – 1:22
10. "Do It Like We Used To Do" (Edited) – 6:49
11. "Stop Don't Panic" (Uncut) – 5:31
12. "Interlude #3
    The Blue Danube
    The Blue Danube is the common English title of An der schönen blauen Donau, Op. 314 , a waltz by the Austrian composer Johann Strauss II, composed in 1866...
    
    " – 0:20
13. "Picture Of My Life" (Vocal Variation – Cut) – 3:46
14. "So Good To Feel Real" – 2:14

Outtakes

"Cannabliss" was a track which was performed live during a pre-album tour in 2001. The track was scrapped from the project after Jay claimed that it wasn't even half complete at the time of going to press. The track's introduction was re-used for "Corner of the Earth". The album's title track, "A Funk Odyssey", was performed by the group while on tour, however, was not included on the album. It is unknown whether this track is an outtake from the album, or was intended as a live-only track. "Shoot The Moon" was a further outtake from the album, performed live at least twice, once at the Montreux Jazz Festival in 2003, and once at a concert in Turkey. A widely-circulated recording of the song being played at the festival exists, and can be found on the group's official website for download. One interesting fact about the song is that it was intended to have a horn section. The band did not have a horn section at the time, so the electric guitar had to substitute the horns. A studio version was never recorded. The test pressing of the album also featured three interludes. The first features band frontman Jay in an electronically manipulated monologue, asking himself why he would want to "shut down the funk assembly unit." The second interlude is a beatbox track, which was later sampled in the single "Feels Just Like It Should", while the third features Strauss

Johann Strauss II

Johann Strauss II , also known as Johann Baptist Strauss or Johann Strauss, Jr., the Younger, or the Son , was an Austrian composer of light music, particularly dance music and operettas. He composed over 500 waltzes, polkas, quadrilles, and other types of dance music, as well as several operettas...

' "The Blue Danube

The Blue Danube

The Blue Danube is the common English title of An der schönen blauen Donau, Op. 314 , a waltz by the Austrian composer Johann Strauss II, composed in 1866...

" being faded in slowly at a low volume. A case of synchronicity

Synchronicity

Synchronicity is the experience of two or more events that are apparently causally unrelated or unlikely to occur together by chance and that are observed to occur together in a meaningful manner...

 occurs when the test pressing is played to Stanley Kubrick

Stanley Kubrick

Stanley Kubrick was an American film director, writer, producer, and photographer who lived in England during most of the last four decades of his career...

's film adaptation

2001: A Space Odyssey (film)

2001: A Space Odyssey is a 1968 epic science fiction film produced and directed by Stanley Kubrick, and co-written by Kubrick and Arthur C. Clarke, partially inspired by Clarke's short story The Sentinel...

 of Arthur C. Clarke's 2001: A Space Odyssey

2001: A Space Odyssey (novel)

2001: A Space Odyssey is a science fiction novel by Arthur C. Clarke. It was developed concurrently with Stanley Kubrick's film version and published after the release of the film...

.

Charts

Year	Chart	Position
2001	Australian ARIA Australian Recording Industry Association The Australian Recording Industry Association is a trade group representing the Australian recording industry which was established in 1983 by six major record companies, EMI, Festival, CBS, RCA, WEA and Universal replacing the Association of Australian Record Manufacturers which was formed in 1956... Albums Chart	1
2002