I had a girlfriend once who made me a cup of coffee in one of those massive ‘grande’ mugs from the machine behind the bar in the place she was working. It had me wired all afternoon. And all evening. And most of the early hours. Turns out that what she’d made me by mistake and put milk in was a grande mug of espresso. Now, if you imagine that the entire personnel of either Big Boss Man or The Qualitons had quaffed such a beverage, then Calibro 35‘s Traditori Di Tutti (cryptically translated as ‘traitors of all’ by googletranslate) is the kind of music they might make.
Presumably named after the calibre of bullet now more familiarly known as ‘9mm’, this Italian crew are inspired by the instrumental soundtracks of classic Italian crime flicks. And, if this is anything to go by, such music seems to consist of a robustly guitar-ified brand of mod rnb/ hammond funk so heavy it occasionally approximates the kind of noise made by Rage Against The Machine. And if you think that’s bullshit blogger hyperbole – check out the ‘mod metal’ instro of Stainless Steel or the mid-track riffage on Traitors. They do atmospheric too though (see the last three LP tracks and Two Pills In The Pocket in particular), moody Bongolian funk (One Hundred Guests) and frantic hammond noodles like Mescaline 6. This one’s still all about Small Faces-on-crank style single Giulia Mon Amor though…
(Out 21 October on Record Kicks)