What happens when The Allergies and Professor Shorthair get their hands on two mighty funk cut from the Big Easy? Nola Breaks V5, that’s what! Yes, Professor Shorthair invited the duo to work their edit-hoodoo on Robert Parker’s classic Everybody’s Hip-Huggin while he took on Betty Harris’s Mean Man himself for a release that is certain to cause a fire on the bayou. Not least of the reasons for this is the way The Allergies get
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Monthly Archives: November 2017
NOLA BREAKS V5: Everybody’s Hip-Huggin (THE ALLERGIES remix)/ Mean Man (PROFESSOR SHORTHAIR remix)(2017)
HOLLIE COOK: ‘Survive’ video (2017) + European tour 2018 dates
“Without your love boy, I just don’t know how to survive,” sings Hollie Cook ethereally on Survive a.k.a one half of recent, excellent reggae double single Freefalling/ Survive. But do we believe her? Perhaps a gander at the new video with its home video-style footage all tastefully shot through a vintage Super 8 style filter will help. But what’s this? Hollie having a shimmy in the kitchen
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TRAMP RECORDS: Feeling Nice Vol. 4 (2017)
Rating: 
If you thought there was only time for one more big-ass rare groove retrospective from Tramp Records before the end of the year with their Countdown To Soul you are sorely (but also happily) mistaken for that honour goes to this – Feeling Nice Vol. 4 – the latest instalment in one of the label’s longest running series. As always, the focus is on the funk and, as always, the
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GIST: Squared (2017)
Many and varied are the permutations of the funk formula but it is hard to think of any artist who manages to successfully draw from both the organic syncopated grooves of the late sixties and the slicker, electro and boogie-influenced funk of the eighties. Still, if that’s what you’re after, Gist may well be your men and their second LP Squared will be the album
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MARTHA HIGH: ‘Mama Feelgood’ audio premiere (2017)
Rating: The monkey does like to line up a dope audio premiere for you and this one is a real treat – James Brown’s original funky diva, Martha High, covers Lyn Collin’s Mama Feelgood with Osaka Monaurail as her backing band. And damn if it ain’t as good as the original. The track is the highlight of Tribute To My Soul Sisters – a whole LP from High and Osaka Monaurail out later
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BREAKBEAT PARADISE RECORDINGS: Bring Back The Funk Vol. 4 (2015)
Who’d have thunk it? It’s been two and a half years since the last volume of a certain BBP comp. so it’s long past time that Breakbeat Paradise dropped Bring Back The Funk Vol. 4 which is a bumper six cuts long. Longtime cohorts Badboe & Prosper stand up first with a Ludacris ‘pella and a James Taylor sample over a suitably beefy disco breaks beat to ensure your smiling face. There’s
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JAZZPROFILACTIKA: Tick Tock (2017)
JazzProfilactika? Now there’s a name to conjure with. But let’s roll on instead to Tick Tock the new nine-track album from the Bulgarian four-piece who consist of a turntablist, a saxophonist, a trumpet and flugelhorn player and keys and French horn player and who started out as an alliance of like-minded djs nearly ten years ago. Along the way, the dj trio became a quintet
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LONG DISTANCE DAN: The Dustman Stirs (2017)
The dustman stirs? Oh what – like on Wednesdays when you get rudely awakened by him and his mates? No Dougal. Not exactly. No, this’ll be The Dustman Stirs as in the latest release from that purveyor of psychedelic breaks, Long Distance Dan, not to mention being our man’s follow-up to 2015’s The Other Side Of The Sky EP and his full-length debut. And that’s ‘full-length’ as
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THE SHACKS: This Strange Effect (Vinyl 7″)(2017)
As well as pumping out the true school soul of Lee Fields and Lady Wray and the more psychedelic outpourings of El Michels Affair, Leon Michels and Danny Akalepse’s Big Crown label is also behind psychedelic wunderkinder The Shacks. If you’ve previously caught anything by them, you’ll know that The Shacks’ sound is defined by two things. One is the sweetly whispery vocals of Shannon
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MARTHA HIGH: Tribute To My Soul Sisters (2017)
Record Kicks must be feeling pretty smug having signed the late great James Brown’s legendary funky diva Martha High for an album of soul and funk covers of classics by High’s peers from back in the day. Well you would wouldn’t you? It gets better though, for High’s Tribute To My Soul Sisters LP finds her interpreting twelve bangers from back in the day with none other than Osaka-to-Tokyo
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