There’s a lot to like about the concept of this project, summed up better than I ever could with the CD’s title itself. But there’s a slight disconnect between the project moniker and the name of the disc, and of the two, the music on Second Line Hip-Hop sounds more like “Tha Nu Jaz Orda” name suggests. In other words, this is not so much a mixture of traditional second line and rap as it is a hip-hop project with jazz roots.

Not that the Orda doesn’t try hard. About half of this ten-song album—tracks two through six, specifically—aim for that kind of musical blend; trumpeter and producer Arden Lo constructs brittle electronic approximations of the famous, skittering second line beat while rapper B.I.F.F. (i.e., Black Is Forever Fabulous) drops rhymes and Arden (who performed all the music) wails here and there. It works fairly well, better than, oh, US3, but the beats don’t have the gravitas necessary to really get asses moving the way a parade band does. Likewise, B.I.F.F.’s raps are solid but nothing special; in fact, this Mardi Gras Records release spends an awful lot of time talking about, well, about Mardi Gras. Nothing wrong with a little creative marketing, but it doesn’t exactly lend this project street cred.

It‘s a shame, too, especially since the end of the record finds Tha Orda retreating into a much more contemporary—and, not coincidentally, more successful—R&B formula. Besides, modern brass bands have flirted with this kind of thing for years now, which means that any hip-hop crew approaching the Holy Grail from the other side needs to come up with something a little more exciting than “Coolin At Tha Jazz Fest,” which is about breaking into the Fest over the back fence. To see, of course, Tha Nu Jaz Orda. Hmm.