The Hot 8 Brass Band is a New Orleans based brass band that blends hip-hop, jazz and funk styles with traditional New Orleans brass sounds. It was formed by Bennie Pete, Jerome Jones, and Harry Cook in 1995,the merging of two earlier bands, the Looney Tunes Brass Band and the High Steppers Brass Band.

The Life and Times Of…is the second album from this New Orleans’s group. Since breaking through via exposure in Spike Lee’s post-Katrina documentary ‘When the Levees Broke’, and more recently David Simon’s Treme TV Series, Hot 8 have become an appealing metaphor for their home city’s hope and vitality.

It’s ingenuous, almost logic-defying arrangements that make the Hot 8 band so special, involving the full spectrum of instruments then making sure they perform to their fullest. The brass doesn’t imitate standard funk components; instead it fully assumes other instruments’ roles, meaning you hear all the parts but not quite as they “should” be.