We know the names : spoken word rocker Marla Mase, the deeply soulful Kevin Jenkins, reggae upstart Tajii, Marla’s kid Lael Summer, funky but fun Charlie Funk, the True Groove Allstars who gave us “We’re A Winner” and the TDB.
They’re all here on Funky World.
With producers Bill Laswell and Touchy Feely, among others, remixing what was pretty toxic heavy duty and industrial strength tracks to start with, what you get is one relentlessly powerful “Groove Club/Dub/Dance” compilation. An hour plus of dense dubby power, funk to the nth, from True Groove records, who are making a name for themselves and only add to their glory here.
Funky World is an album all too easy to take for granted, coming as a sort of stop gap to the TDB, that’s Tomas Doncker Band too you, two masterpieces, Moanin’ At Midnight on one side, and Big Apple Blues on the other. It feels like Tomas having a lark before the heavy lifting starts
It feels like that, but it isn’t.
Stolen by the former Material hero Laswell, he adds so much rubadub on Marla Mase’s “Annarexia” it is a mutation away from trip hop, and hitting clean up on the album, it collects the immense amount of good will built up the title “Funky World” and one of the great songs of this or any other “Kong”. Never before has the King Kong legend been taken this far with the snarling spit from the back of lungs kiss off: “Get out my face, you can’t own a man”.
But the album is just beginning and it keeps stopping you in its track where the art rock of Samuel Claiborne is sandwidged between Charlie Funk’s George Clinton worth “Sexy Cutie” and “Half Life” –a song so much a part of the True Groove legend it gets remixed twice. Kevin is like the Philly sound personified.
Funky World never stops popping and never stops grooving, put it on repeat and a party can take care of itself and while I felt it was a little light in the dance department and it coulda used some of the Laswell gift on EDM beats, it is something he could really do very well . So it is the dub portion that really blows your mind, “Bato Bese” sounds like dub goes to broadway, it is a strange and beautiful thing and even with that the album reaches its zenith with the large and transgressive the Mighty Diamond’s cover “Why Me Black Brother Why” – Lee “Scratch” Perry would be proud to put his name on. this is something like the true Groove form, they will have a lot of great material and then here and there they will take it to a whole other level.
With all that, waiting in the wings is Big Apple Blues, an album so of a piece it makes Funky World seem to lack a sense of balance, it feels a little too decentralized to be one of their masterpieces. Still, if that’s the worst I can say about the albumi t must be very much so worth your while.
Grade: A-
