Pino Palladino & Blake Mills Share ‘Ekuté’ Single

Pino Palladino and Blake Mills shared a new single, “Ekuté.” The song is set to land on the duo’s upcoming collaborative album, Notes With Attachments, arriving on March 12 via New Deal / Impulse!

Acclaimed bassist Pino Palladino and renowned multi-instrumentalist and producer Blake Mills announced Notes With Attachments in January and shared the lead single, “Just Wrong.” While the record started out as a Palladino solo album with Mills producing, the duo realized that it was a collaborative effort when they began working on “Ekuté,” the journey for which began in London where Palladino and drummer Chris Dave drew inspiration from afro-beat legend Fela Kuti.

“It just came from a one-chord jam that I liked the feel of,” Palladino said of the song. “The next thing we did on it was in New York, with Ben Kane, an engineer friend of mine who worked on some of D’Angelo’s stuff. We had Marcus Strickland come in, who had the idea for that multitracked bass-clarinet horn section.”

“It was eye-opening to hear something that was repetitive, but still had so many different [directions] that it went in,” Mills added. “It was kind of a revelation, to work on a song in those terms.”

Stream “Ekuté” below: