★★★★☆
“Hi, hello, is anybody there? Let me know if you can hear me,” asks Thundercat, aka 35-year-old jazz bassist turned pop eccentric Stephen Bruner, with the opening words of his fourth album. It proves a pertinent question. Bruner could not have known It Is What It Is would come out when much of the world is in lockdown, but its dreamlike mood, boredom-induced throwaway humour and general feeling of being the work of a man who spends too much time on his own is eerily appropriate.
Bruner is an unlikely success. A Los Angeles virtuoso with a signature six-stringed Ibanez bass guitar, he spent years as a session player for hip-hop and soul names including Kendrick Lamar and Erykah Badu while specialising in the