Now then. This is a bit late and would have gone up a week ago but for the Great Monkeyboxing PHP Update Disaster, when things went awry, to say the least. Since all things MB now seem more stable though, maybe today is the time to consider how Mr Boca 45 himself has managed to wrest personal victory from the jaws of another’s disaster, or at least construct a cover version of Gala’s dreadful 1997 Europop dirge Freed From Desire that doesn’t make you want to cut your own head off. In a review of the original, Music Week noted that it “…has similar appeal to Crystal Waters’ Gypsy Woman,” like that was a good thing, by a writer clearly freed from the ability to hear. Irrespective of that writer’s intent, the words still hold true because Gypsy Woman is surely the only example of that maddeningly shit boom-cha, boom-cha Euro-beat and a droning one-note ‘melody’ even more egregious than Gala’s effort – the sort of thing that makes Haddaway look like Marvin fucking Gaye. Enter Boca 45. Gala’s vocals and the tackiest beat known to man are gone before you can say ‘utter shite,’ replaced by a jangly funk groove from Bristol band Waldo’s Gift and a voice with some actual soul in it courtesy of Yolanda ‘Yola’ Quartey. The effect of the new version is instant; in fact, it’s akin to having your mind and senses purified. Indeed, it’s not unlikely you might find yourself singing along and not even mind! Altogether now: “Na na-na na-nana na na-na na na…” Oh yes, and flip features the reassuringly spy-funk tinged breakbeat bounce of more regular Boca fare, Suki’s Revenge Pt 2, by the way.
(Out now on Bombstrikes)