It’s a shitty feeling when your favorite rappers come off an extended hiatus with a brand new album that truly sucks. Fortunately for Brand Nubian, their skills are still intact. Grand Puba, Lord Jamar and Sadat X have reunited after six years for an album that is both conscious and jiggy, a throwback that manages to move forward at the same time. The at-times overly futuristic beats and excessively positive rhymes may not please everyone, but an appropriate balance between lyrical skills and scathing social commentary saves the album.
Various Artists Black Power: Music of a Revolution
This two-disc compilation draws from popular and lesser-known catalogs of soul and incorporates sound-bites from revolutionaries like Huey Newton, Stokely Carmichael and Malcolm X, making it a comprehensive introduction to the sounds of the black power and arts movements of the 1960s and 70s. It’s a smart addition to novice soul collections, contextualizing the work of soul artists in reference to the socio-political upheaval of the time. Highlights include the informed historical narrative insert, and classic (and oft-sampled) tracks like Gil-Scott Heron’s “The Revolution Will Not Be Televised,” and Gene McDaniel’s “Compared to What.”
Antibalas Who Is This America?
With the Afrobeat awakening finally ringing loud and clear across dancefloors nationwide, Brooklyn’s Antibalas Afrobeat Orchestra returns to prove they’re still the baddest on the block. Their characteristic, churning boombast descends immediately, with the slinky guitar and torrential horn storm of the title track and “Pay Back Africa”; it continues later as album closers “Elephant” and “Sister” stretch out darkly hypnotic rhythms into epic, Fela-esque lengths. The band’s anti-establishment politics resound throughout, but perhaps loudest on “Indictment,” a hilarious, funky People’s Court send-up that reveals a newfound sense of humor layered over some of the band’s most urgent playing.
Los Amigos Invisibles The Venezuelan Zinga Son Vol. 1
With an album title that translates to “Venezuelan fuckfest,” you know what these guys have on their mind. The six horndogs of Los Amigos Invisibles-a few years older but hardly all grown up-return with their third release on David Byrnes globe-spanning Luaka Bop imprint. This time their trademark sweaty Latin funk is polished silvery smooth by original Nuyoricans Masters At Work, whose production influence shines within the album’s glistening keys, snappy boogaloo breaks, and subtle electronic hum. Like a good party, the album teases initially with loungy atmospherics, but by the end of the last track you’ll need a cold shower and a slap in the face.
Tin Hat Trio Book Of Silk
On a darkened hilltop above a grassy, windswept plain, in the creaking attic of an ancient clapboard house, Tin Hat Trio spins out rustic, mournful chamber music to old ghosts, dust-coated mice and anyone patient enough to listen. Using a variety of acoustic instruments (mainly guitar, violin, and accordion), the band evokes haunted memories of forgotten musical styles: bluegrass, flamenco, Gypsy jazz and classical Eastern European waltzes are all woven into their evocative mix. With so many ideas flourishing, these compositions should run longer and delve deeper; most ignite a flickering spark but never stoke it enough to let it truly burn.
Romanowski Party In My Pants
Usually a mix so ecstatically upbeat and shamelessly funky wouldn’t show so much innovation, but Swiss-born SF stalwart producer/DJ Romanowski has long excelled at pulling off high wire stunts in oversized clown shoes. It takes serious skill and a lot of chutzpah to bounce from The Darkness-style cockrocking swagger to electro-fried breaks to flute-looped hip-hop samba in 36 minutes, but Roman brings it all to the front without leaking technique out the back. This is no novelty mashup, but one man’s deeply expressed, nearly saintly devotion to rocking the party. The smile on your face will be as wide as the shake of your hips.
Spam Allstars Contra Los Roboticos Mutantes
Like a stroll down South Beach’s Collins Avenue, the Spam Allstars bristle with the swank and sensuality of an Afro-Cuban beachside paradise. Over the past year they’ve been blowing up club residencies in Miami and Manhattan, rubbing their cocoa butter funk across crowds of slick salseros and dreadlocked bohos alike. Live horns, flute, timbales and guitar float through the groove while DJ Spam’s subtle scratches and a bass-heavy 808 throb throw dancers into the deep end. Their fourth LP is lushly organic and feverishly danceable, blurring the lines between live and dub with seamless production and blissed-out songwriting. Believe it or not, Spam is the sabor you’re looking for.
Paik Satin Black
As my friend says, half-horrified half-confused about one drunken coupling, “It was just so naked so fast!” Paik’s Satin Black ain’t no making out-its post-rock gets naked real fast with the first three of its five long tracks practically leaping out of the gate already at full pitch and staying there throughout the whole duration of this mini-album. Satin Black is full of crashing cymbals, hypnotically droning guitar waves and swarms of feedback, with “Dizzy Stars” being the lone track that mildly teases with its push and pull of volume. Getting down immediately is hot, but maybe a little seduction is hotter?
Signer The New Face Of Smiling
More low-key shimmer and magenta shine from the Carpark roster. The New Face feels muted, just short of vibrant, in its light glitch ‘n’ glow, but the processed guitar wails that Signer pulls through the beats make for a nice sandpapery feel. The New Face… also features drowsy vocals (as on “Machines at Low Tide”) that lead the way until distorted guitars openly yawn. “Hurricane or Sunshine” is perhaps the climax of Signer’s style, with its delicate little skip definitely putting a new kind of shy smile on the face of your CD collection.
Up, Bustle & Out City Breakers
UBO are still sending out the stoney vibe, son. Humid grooves touched with light horns, you know? But with City Breakers, Up Bustle & Out’s stepping away from the Peruvian flutes and radio rebelde politics of past albums and heading into some rooftop reggae dub, and it’s a nice trip. “Bob Your Head” has a smartly snappy rap. “Rainbow,” a full and satisfying dub mix, has a slowly wavering horn that floats up thick and hazy like the blur of hot air rising from a summer sidewalk. And “Dance Your Troubles Away” is the mandate your citystompin’ ass won’t be able to resist.
