Quick Answer: It's What We Do is a masterclass in restraint disguised as virtuosity—Thundercat's bass work is genuinely transcendent, but it's Flying Lotus's refusal to overcomplicate that makes this 43-minute album feel complete rather than undernourished. This is what happens when you pair a bassist who learned the rules inside-out with a producer smart enough to know when to disappear.
The first thing you notice about Stephen Bruner is that he doesn’t play bass like someone trying to prove he’s the best. He plays it like someone who learned from Ron Carter and Victor Wooten and then decided the rules could bend a little further.
“It’s What We Do” arrives fully formed in 2013—not a debut that sounds like someone finding their voice, but like someone who already has one and is simply introducing you to it. The album is a conversation between jazz traditions that are forty years old and a production sensibility that belongs entirely to the moment. Thundercat is the throughline, but the company matters: Flying Lotus appears as producer and co-conspirator on the majority of the record, which means you’re getting a bassist capable of playing circles around most professionals paired with someone who understands how to frame that virtuosity inside something you might actually want to hear at two in the morning.
The opening track sets a pattern. Bruner’s bass doesn’t sit in the pocket—it orbits it. On “Between UA & LA,” the fretless work is melodic enough to be a lead instrument, and it probably should be, except that the arrangement won’t let it fully settle. That’s the design of this album: every element is both foreground and background depending on which listen you’re on. The production is clean in the way that Japanese engineering is clean—purposeful silence everywhere there isn’t a note.
The Collaboration
Flying Lotus and Thundercat had been orbiting each other for years on the L.A. beat scene before this record. What they built together on “It’s What We Do” is neither electronic nor fusion in the purist sense—it’s something else entirely. The drums come from Beats Antique’s Zac Farro on several tracks, but there’s also programming, which means there’s a conversation happening between human swing and digital precision. That tension is the entire album in miniature.
“Walk With Me” is probably the strongest example. Thundercat’s bass line is simple enough that you could play it on a baritone sax, but he adds weight and texture that comes purely from how his fingers move. The production doesn’t fight it—it gets out of the way. That’s harder to do than it sounds. Most producers would feel compelled to add something, to justify their presence. Flying Lotus trusts the source material.
There’s also a cleanliness to the engineering that bears mentioning. These sessions came together at a handful of L.A. studios over several months in 2012, but the album has a coherence that suggests careful planning and probably more than one evening of mixing decisions made by people who understand that a record is a physical object that will live in your system, not just a file that gets compressed and distributed.
The Constraint
The toughest thing about “It’s What We Do” is that it’s short—forty-three minutes, which in 2013 already felt like a statement against the bloat that had become normal. There are seven songs, and they move quickly. “Them Changes” is probably the furthest Thundercat ventures toward something you could call pop, and it’s still asking you to listen carefully. The hook is minimal. The bass could have been simplified; instead it’s elaborated in a way that only rewards attention.
What sticks longest is the sense that this is music made by people who didn’t need to prove anything to anyone. Bruner was already known. Flying Lotus was already known. This album wasn’t built on ambition—it was built on curiosity about what would happen if you put a fretless bassist and a beat-maker in a room together and let them work at their own speed.
The record is patient in a way that patience became unfashionable during its release year. It refuses to announce what it’s doing. It simply does it, and waits for you to catch up.
🎵 Key Takeaways
- Bruner plays bass like Ron Carter and Victor Wooten merged into someone new.
- The album sounds fully formed, not like someone discovering their voice yet.
- Bass orbits the pocket instead of sitting in it on every track.
- Flying Lotus production frames virtuosity into something listenable at two in morning.
- Human swing and digital precision create tension across the entire album.
- Every element functions as both foreground and background simultaneously.
How does Thundercat's bass playing on 'It's What We Do' differ from traditional jazz fusion approaches?
Bruner's bass orbits the pocket rather than sitting firmly in it, functioning as a melodic lead instrument through fretless work while maintaining supporting harmonic roles—a balance that draws from Ron Carter and Victor Wooten but extends beyond their frameworks. Flying Lotus's production philosophy complements this by creating purposeful silence and avoiding over-arrangement, allowing the bass texture and finger technique to drive the sound rather than competing elements.
What role did Flying Lotus play in shaping the sound of this album beyond standard production duties?
Flying Lotus produced the majority of the record and functioned as a co-conspirator in framing Thundercat's virtuosity within contemporary production sensibilities rather than traditional fusion contexts. His approach demonstrates restraint—trusting the source material enough to step back rather than justify his presence through additional layers, which was unusual for producers of that era.
Why did Thundercat keep 'It's What We Do' to 43 minutes across seven tracks when industry standards favored longer albums?
The deliberate brevity represented a statement against bloat that had become normalized by 2013, with each track moving quickly and purposefully. This constraint forced focused compositions and suggests the album was conceived as a physical object designed for cohesive listening in a hi-fi system rather than padded for streaming metrics.
Further Reading
Frequently Asked Questions
Q: Is this Thundercat's best album?
It's certainly his most focused. While later records like Drunk and It Never Went Away show more range and personality, It's What We Do remains unmatched in its clarity of purpose—a statement of technical mastery filtered through Flying Lotus's disciplined production. Whether that makes it 'best' depends on whether you prioritize purity or ambition.
Q: What's the difference between this and Flying Lotus's own work?
Flying Lotus here is a curator rather than the primary voice. His production aesthetic is unmistakable—that Japanese-engineered cleanliness, the digital-organic balance—but Thundercat's bass is the actual subject. Think of it as FlyLo learning to step back and let someone else's genius breathe, which is its own kind of statement.
Q: Should I start with this or Drunk?
Start here if you want to understand why Thundercat matters technically; start with Drunk if you want his full personality. It's What We Do is the album that proves the chops. Drunk is the album that proves he had something to say all along.