I was once told that reviewing something you hate is a lot easier than reviewing something you love. I think that’s probably true – anger will take you a long way when talking about anything, whereas sycophancy seems harder to correctly articulate. That probably explains why this review has taken me basically forever and a day to write.
Jackanory and the Ball’s creatively titled The. E.P is one of the most compelling and complete records from a new artist that I’ve listened to in quite some time.
The duo consists of producer and general urban magician Michael Rendall aka Jackanory, and Bath born M.C and singer Tom Skelton aka Ball. Both have relatively decorated musical pasts, of which you can find more about on their website.
This E.P is the result of something that began as a passion project. The record is aiming to create a legitimate and credible cross between Hip Hop, Jazz, Pop, Soul and anything else that they happen to have been inspired by.
I’ve been aware of these two for a long time now and first heard some of the tracks featured on this E.P around 3 years ago. This is actually the source of my only complaint with this record – recycling of very old material, but it shouldn’t affect first time listeners in anyway whatsoever.
Opening the E.P is a song I plugged in a blog earlier this week. ‘Audio Precision’ is a perfect introduction to the band, it’s fun, has a great opening and is superbly produced. When I first heard it I thought it was probably what Lily Allen would sound like if she and her entire band had a car crash with DJ Shadow and his record collection.
It’s actually not that typical stylistically of the rest of the record or from what I’ve heard in live shows the rest of their material, but it’s so damn catchy you’ll probably not be able to stop listening to it for about a week.
Next up is another brilliantly produced number ‘Not The One’. This song has one of the smoothest swing rhythms you’re likely to hear from a British act which is complimented throughout the song by some excellent and perfectly timed tight, rhythmic punches. The verses are possibly a little to full in this song and I would have liked to have heard them stripped down to just bass, drums and piano. Half way through the first verse an organ of some description crashes in with a staccato quaver rhythm that totally drowns out and negates the excellent swing I earlier championed. This is however made up for by some seriously slick musicianship in the second verse.
The standout song is by some distance the E.P’s sign off ‘Come Away With Me’, which feels the most authentic as both a Hip-Hop and Soul track. It’s in this song we best hear the versatility of Ball’s voice, intimately rhyming into our ears in the verses before soaring atop the elegant musical arrangement for the chorus.
This is honestly a great record and I strongly urge you all to listen to it now by scrolling down, then download it for free by clicking here. You can find out everything you need to know about the band by visiting their website. A full album will be released soon and they will be gigging throughout the year.
If you would like to be reviewed then please get in touch; luke@routenote.com or on twitter @monkeyhotel
Milwaukee soul band Kings Go Forth is just about to launch their debut album, The Outsiders Are Back. Kings Go Forth has been getting a lot of positive press from many soul music blogs and even spun by the likes of DJ Shadow.
Written by Noble and Wolf, the full-length of nine original songs includes the Moulton mix of “Don’t Take My Shadow.” The album’s lone cover is an impossibly obscure soul lament written and recorded in a prison. In addition to Noble and Wolf, Kings Go Forth features Andy Noble on bass, Dave Wake on keyboards, guitarist Dan Flynn, percussionist Cecilio Negron, Jr., the explosive drummer Jeremy Kuzniar, trombonist Dave Cusma, trumpeter Jed Groser, vocalist Dan Fernandez, and rhythm guitarist and vocalist Matt Norberg.
Just a quick line to promote someone else’s good work here; San Francisco based blog, Stranger Dance have put together a collection of covers by Bon Iver, a really scruffy-soulful independent artist who I’ve seen live and loved. Do yourself a favour and check him out… You could even show the love and buy some of his music on iTunes.
Old school revival. Recorded on old analogue equipment in a Brooklyn bedroom by a group of young soul musicians, this album has a sound straight out of the early 70′s. The music sounds like it’s been lifted from a classic film soundtrack: if Marvin Gaye had written the score to a Bond movie it might sound something like this. There are no samples, no casio-tone saxophone parts, no vocoders, just live instruments arranged well, played well and recorded well, like music used to be when people cared about what they were producing, instead of jumping about like strippers in front of a listless, pallid audience of 17 year old girls. Even on the digital version this sounds like classic soul that’s been maturing in someone’s vinyl collection for the last three decades. Like a vintage wine, take it down from the rack, gently wipe away the imagined dust, stroke the album cover in anticipation of the sensual delights you’re about to enjoy, and lift the stylus gently into position. Immediately you’ll hear a snappy, shuffling complex beat, maybe backed with a bit of piano, then a guitar drops into the groove, picked out with a long, reverb soaked xylophone, and then you notice that your head has been bobbing like Stevie Wonder for the last 30 seconds and whoops, here comes the horn section and there’s funk all up in your ears.
I admit it, I’m biased. I love that old funk and soul (although it’s by no means the guiltiest of my pleasures) – there’s so much feeling in it, especially compared to all the angry rap and vacuous pop rock that make up ‘pop’ at the moment. Having said that, Jay-Z was awarded Rolling Stone’s best single of 2007 for his track ‘Roc Boys’, which is basically just a sample of the really cool beat and horn section hook from title track ‘Make the Road by Walking’, with him rapping about how brilliant he is all over it. What makes me sad is that Jay-Z probably made millions from the single, and the album’s producer/creator Thomas Brenneck will have got nothing like as much for actually writing the song. Still, chin up.
If you’re into Otis Redding, Aretha Franklin, Al Green, Marvin Gaye or Amy Winebox, or the idea of a bluesy, funky, soulful instrumental album appeals to you, then buy this and you’ll love it. I can pretty much guarantee you’ll be hearing it in movies, adverts and sampled in other more ‘pop’ artists songs as soon as the music supervisors of the world feel it’s safe enough, so you might as well get a copy and annoy your friends by telling them who that track on the advert is by, and how they should really go and check out the Daptone records site, because there’re really a load of great music up there, funk and soul as it should be, or at the very least check out The Menahan Street Band or Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings (the musicians’ other band) on YouTube or iTunes.
I was once told that reviewing something you hate is a lot easier than reviewing something you love. I think that’s probably true – anger will take you a long way when talking about anything, whereas sycophancy seems harder to correctly articulate. That probably explains why this review has taken me basically forever and a day to write.
