| www.newmusicreviews.co.uk | POP / ROCK / FOLK MUSIC including singer-songwriters | ||||
  |
Track playing...
One-Two Punch – Liquid Soul (Telarc) www.liquidsoul.com Over the years I’ve often found myself at odds with the jazz scene because even its greatest exponents exhibit an unsettling tendency to indulge in far-too-frequent, sanctimonious (soul)train-spotting sessions up their own orifices. One-two Punch, from Chicago-based eight-piece collective Liquid Soul certainly blows clear through any metaphorical back passages – and there’s no doubt that band-leader/composer/saxophonist Mars Williams knows how not to suck! This is about the freshest, most exhilarating album I’ve heard in a very long while. Track 1 powers off with a hypnotic trance riff akin to Pigbag’s marvellous Papa’s got a brand new pigbag. Tr.2 starts with a clipped dance drum-track that soon develops a more sensuous lurch to its groove with jingling funk guitar and big brass from Spandau Ballet’s Chant No 1: We don’t need this pressure on – or maybe we do? Tr.3 starts as a cool soul-rap with GM Melly Mel Don’t push me styling, before a liquid trumpet and vibes section does push us on to yet more superlative, trademark wild honky horns. And so it goes on. This album is fantastically diverse: trippy Brand X jazz-rock soundscapes, (anything but) Average White Band licks with intensity turned up to 11, respectful nods to the funking godfather James Brown – and the whole lot underpinned with bass lines that would put a Flea in the Chilli Peppers’ ears (and hopefully remind them what it was once like to be good). No, it ain’t New Age in any sense, but with this passionate blend of sophisticated syncopation and raw exuberant life it certainly elevates the ‘spirit’ in ‘spiritual’. - Kinski, Nov '06
|
|
|||
|
All reviews and articles ©2007 Kinski, Kaufman and NewMusicReviews.co.uk |
|||||
Amazon.co.uk
Amazon.com