Common Releases “Let Love” with Burniss Travis on Bass

by Kevin Johnson Thursday, September 5th, 2019

Common: Let Love After publishing his book Let Love Have the Last Word, Common has released a new album more simply entitled Let Love. The new record is inspired by his book, but not necessarily a soundtrack.

“[My book] gave me a path to write about things I had never written about before. It forced me to go deeper and because I opened up about so many things in the book, I was charged to go to raw, personal and spiritual places in the music,” Common said. “Production-wise, I knew that the music had to have depth, soul, and dimension to it. I wanted the musicianship and the spirit of what live music brings, but it also had to have something raw and basement about it. When my team said, ‘You should do some music revolving around the book,’ I just took that energy and went running into my artistry without focusing on anything else. No movies, no commercials, no parties (well, I don’t do that too much anyway) and I just worked on music. So this album is the culmination of this journey, this passion and this Divine Love that I have for one of GOD’s greatest gifts – MUSIC.”

The album has several guest appearances including Daniel Caesar, Dwele, Jill Scott, Swizz Beatz, and more. Core to Let Love’s sound is the band Common assembled, which is mostly made up of members from his group with Robert Glasper called August Greene. That includes drummer Karriem Riggins on drums, Samora Pinderhughes on keyboards, and Burniss Travis on bass. Travis is also credited with writing and production on the album.

Watch the video for “Hercules,” featuring Swizz Beatz: