Hard Groove's the inevitable full-length after a series of one-off cameos with the likes of fellow Arts Magnet attraction Erykah Badu, Common and D'Angelo, who return the favor; also dropping by, sounds like at 3 in the a.m. when the studio smells of more than just incense, are Q-Tip, Meshell Ndegeocello, Pino Palladino and some 16 other soul stirrers who turn Hargrove into a special guest on his own record. Don't know if it all works--at times, the fusion sounds like an ominous Weather Report; occasionally there's a quiet storm a-brewin'--but what does hit the mark sticks and stings. The Badu-Ndegeocello-Tip tip, "Poetry," has more firepower than Mama's Gun; D'Angelo's redo of "I'll Stay" stands on the verge of getting it on and gives in only at the last little bit; and "Juicy," with Renee Neufville singing and James Poyser ringing his Rhodes, runs all down your hands. But in the end what Hargrove's doing is staking his claim to the claim that everything funky about funk and soulful about soul comes from jazz anyhow, which makes Hard Groove, ya know, less evolutionary than merely inevitable.