S H O O K M A G /////// » andy thomas

Umalali “The Garifuna Women’s project” (Stonetree Records)

admin — Thu, 29 May 2008 10:18:47 +0000

With the tragic passing of musician and leader of the Garifuna Collective Andy Palacio, this collection of songs recorded by Garifuna women in his home town of Hopkins, acts as something of a eulogy to the man who did so much to promote and protect his people’s music and culture. While it was Andy who received most attention during last year’s media flirtation with this little known music out of the Caribbean Coast of Central America, it was the depth of the folkloric traditions that made the story so interesting. And as label owner Ivan Duran explains in the notes it is the women who are the caretakers of the Garifuna traditions while the men go off to sea or increasingly to work abroad. So in 2002, following years of research, Duran set off to bring together some of those voices until then only heard around the homes and villages or at the Garifuna ceremonies. Travelling the region he found incredible singers like 54-year-old Guatemalan mother of four Sofia Blanco whose raw soulful voice opens this wonderful collection, and the Honduran Marcela ‘Chela’ Torres one of the singers who will hopefully be bringing her deep bluesy vocals to London later in the year as a tribute to Andy Palacio. With subtle contemporary production and ambience from Ivan Duran helping this music to translate onto CD, this is another example of the power and the glory of this little known music. (Andy Thomas)

V/A “Rools For Rules” (Bear Funk)

admin — Thu, 29 May 2008 10:18:00 +0000

On a wet Monday morning after Danielle Bandelli had gently rocked the Cosmic pants off Horse Meat Disco and the Idjut Boys had helped open the East Villlage in Old Street, this little gem landed on my doorstep. Long before the broadsheets decided Cosmic was to be the sound of the Summer, the Chicken Lips collaborator Steve Kotey was releasing music by those who wanted to add a little space dust to their disco. This 2 CD package (CD1 mixed by Kotey and CD2 by DJ Kent) shows why Bearfunk 12”s are staples with the likes of Bandelli and the Idjuts. Alongside space funk gems from Nordic producers Lindstrom (with the heavy Larry Young-like moog frenzy of ‘Drums of Life’), Rune Lindbaek (collaborating with the Idjut Boys on ‘Laisn’) and Todd Terje (mixed by Prins Thomas) sit three great tracks by Italy’s cosmic wunderkind Fabrizio Mammarella, a few obscurities from the likes of Giorgio Sancristoforo and a stunning version of Giorgio Moroder’s teutonic disco classic ‘Sooner Or Later’ by Steve Kotey and Chaz Jankel. (Andy Thomas)

Kelley Polar “I Need You To Hold On While The Sky Is Falling” (Environ)

admin — Thu, 29 May 2008 10:17:02 +0000

What with Hercules & Love Affair recruiting Antony Hegarty for the much hyped ‘Blind’, and this Croation-born and Juilliard-educated producer creating tracks with titles like ‘Love Songs Of The Hanging Gardens’ there is a quiet little movement of producers looking for some drama with their disco, taking their cue from the likes of Marc Almond and The Associates. Kelley Polar and his viola appeared on some of Metro Area’s finest works including the classic ‘Miura’ and this partnership continues with Polar’s debut on Morgan Geist’s label, with Darshan Jesrani at the mixing desk. With Polar’s ears tuned to everything from Kraftwerk and Schubert to Thomas Dolby and Dvorak this was never going to be an everyday dance record, and the album might take a couple of listens; but once the yearning leftfield pop of ‘Satellites’, the sinister disco of ‘Entropy Reigns’, and the cascading synth licks of ‘Chrysanthemum’ get inside your head, the romantic yet dark Polar sound won’t let you go. In the same way as a group like Dr Buzzard’s Savannah Band went left of the disco mainstream, Kelley Polar is eschewing the Bandelli fixations of many of his contemporaries to create highly individual music that brings some drama and character to electronic music. A brave and infectious record. (Andy Thomas)

V/A “Spiritual Jazz” (Jazzman)

admin — Thu, 29 May 2008 10:16:12 +0000

“As far as spirituality is concerned, I feel that I want to be the force which is truly for good,” said John Coltrane back in 1966, and the musicians on this compilation must have equally been driven by the same desire to play music for the creator, and at the same time music that spoke directly to their people. While the sleevenotes make the case that much of this music worked at a more cerebral level than that of the free jazz crowd, this was still the sound of struggle. Francis Gooding probably gets it about right when he says “If the Fire Music of Archie Shepp was a call for social and political change, then spiritual jazz asked for personal change…The ‘60s was the decade in which the personal became the political.” On what is the best jazz compilation since Soul Brother’s African Spirits, James Tatum Trio provides the introduction with a stunning ‘Jazz Mass’ recorded in Detroit and when you consider this was a City still recovering from the uprisings, then Cornwell Carrington’s plea of ‘Lord Have Mercy’ takes on a deep resonance. Lloyd Miller was just one of many jazzmen of the period to look East for enlightenment and ‘Gol-e Gandom’ is a truly stunning piece of modal jazz. Salah Ragab was of course the Egyptian who collaborated with Sun Ra during his famous visit and alongside Senegal’s Mor Thiam shows here how players across the world were inspired by Trane’s message. But it’s the Stateside players here who shine the brightest, and big respect to the Jazzman crew for opening our ears to the likes of Morris Wilson whose ‘Paul’s Ark’ is as moody a piece of biblical jazz as you’ll ever here, and for digging deep to find gems like ‘Psych City’ from the inmates of Ohio Penitentiary. Now you really do need to check that one! (Andy Thomas)

Toumani Diabate “Mande Variations” (World Circuit)

admin — Thu, 29 May 2008 10:15:17 +0000

Where others are hearing everyone from Miles Davis to Toumani’s great mentor Ali Farka Toure in this return to the great kora players acoustic roots, there is something about the space and meditative flow here that brings to my mind both Sun Ra and Alice Coltrane. It was only after reading the sleeve notes that I discovered that for this album this kora innovator had come up with a new way of tuning his kora that he refers to as his Egyptian method. On his solo return following his outing with the Symmetric Orchestra, Toumani sits alone with his kora, and weaves one of his most beautiful and evocative tracks yet. Full of lyrical beauty and stretched out over 10 minutes ‘Si Naani’ is simply stunning in terms of musicianship (with those trademark intertwining bass lines and melody in full force) and justifies Lucy Duran’s views that Toumani is once again breaking new ground for the kora. This is clear in the way he plays with conventions without losing sight of the ancestral traditions; creating a piece of Malian beauty out of UB40’s Kingston Town melody on ‘Elyne Road’ or improvising with both flamenco and Mauritanian music on ‘El Nabiyouna’. Another essential World Circuit trip to Mali. (Andy Thomas)

V/A “Funky Nassau: The Compass Point Story, 1980-86” (Strut)

admin — Thu, 29 May 2008 10:14:33 +0000

“I wanted a new progressive sounding band…a Jamaican rhythm section with an edgy mid-range and a brilliant synth player,” recalls Island Record’s Chris Blackwell in the sleevenotes to this collection from these legendary studios in the Bahamas where everyone from the Rolling Stones to Marianne Faithful to AC/DC recorded. Blackwell got what he wanted when he recruited as the house band Sly and Robbie fresh from their tour with Peter Tosh, and keyboardist Wally Badarou who had just worked on M’s ‘Pop Muzik’. But the dubdisco that became the Compass Point ––sound and peaked on albums such as Grace Jones’ ‘Warm Leatherette’ and Talking Heads’ ‘Remain In Light’, owed as much to the studio/engineer pairing of Alex Sadkin and Steven Stanley as it did to the band. Compass Point’s sound also benefitted from the connection to the No Wave scene, sealed by its association with Ze Records who came through with albums from the likes of Lizzy Mercier Descloux and Cristina whose ‘You Rented a Space’ is one of the more leftfield cuts here. With Ian Dury’s Garage classic ‘Spasticus Autisticus’ nestling seedily next to FK’s hens teeth remix of ‘Dance Sucker’ from Scottish post punkers Set The Tone, this is great both as an introduction and for those wanting to dig a little deeper into the Compass Point archives. (Andy Thomas)