By Ed Enright | Published March 2025
Post Graduation Fees is the third release from KADAWA, the Brooklyn-based collective power trio of guitarist Tal Yahalom, double bassist Almog Sharvit and drummer Ben Silashi that’s been disrupting preconceived notions of avant-garde jazz and hard rock via their outrageous and inspired roughhousing since coming to America in 2014. KADAWA creates original instrumental compositions marked by cosmically complex arrangements that make bold use of rhythmic counterpoint, cerebral melodies, unorthodox chord progressions, thrilling improvisations, spacious sonic palettes comprising clean and affected psychedelic tones, and a raw underlying aesthetic that manages to find that perfect sweet spot between the dead-serious and the irreverently humorous. At times explosive and aggressive, celebratory and engaging, dreamy and soothing, their music draws from a vast arsenal of stylistic influences and instrumental techniques and resides in range of tempos conjuring caffeinated urgency, floating dreaminess, steady-driving grooves and easygoing strolls. These three bad boys met in the Stricker academic program at the Israeli Conservatory, Tel Aviv; eventually they all moved to New York together, releasing their debut, KADAWA (featuring trumpeter Adam O’Farrill, keyboardist Micha Gilad and trombonist Matt Bumgardner on a few tracks), in 2017. That was followed in 2023 by a three-tune EP written and recorded in collaboration with the deeply unconventional singer, songwriter and producer Grey Mcmurray titled Downward Jewel. The chops-sporting band takes its name from an edgy variation of a game of tag that Yahalom, Sharvit and Silashi used to play as teenagers back home that involved chasing, kicking and shouting — a fun, apropos way to describe their musical and inner-personal dynamics. With Post Graduation Fees, KADAWA shows that it has enough intergenerational appeal — and more than sufficient momentum — to continue pushing the limits of jazz, rock and improvised music for at least another decade to come.
