It's been slowly drip-fed to us over a 10-month period but now here at last is the full album. On 'Something Like That', Jalapeno bosses Skeewiff celebrate 25 years in the game by paying tribute to some of the music that's inspired them, delivering generally very faithful but also very accomplished reworks of classic tracks by artists ranging from The Winstons and Jimmy Smith to Dick Dale and Herb Alpert. New additions to the roster on this final version include Nancy Sinatra's 'These Boots Are Made For Walking', Muppets 'Mah Na Mah Na', Mel Tormé's Mod club standard 'Coming Home Baby' and, just to prove they're not taking themselves TOO seriously, Boots Randolph's 'Yakety Sax' - better known to most as the 'Benny Hill' theme.
Sonar Kollektiv present the first solo album from German drummer, composer and producer Janek van Laak, previously best known as one-half of the duo Tutu Amuse alongside vocalist and fellow Berlin native Rosa Landers, and as co-founder of the experimental outfit Liquid Brain Orchestra. 'Circle Of Madness' is a largely instrumental affair but does feature a brace of guest vocalists - Australia's Madeleine Rose on 'Here To Slay' and Japan's Shiomi Kawaguchi on 'Daiamondo', while van Laak himself sings on a couple of tracks. Musically, it's wonked-out, off-kilter drums and horns that do most of the heavy lifting, augmented by floaty keys and the occasional electronic parp and squelch. Definitely one for those who like things on the more out-there side.
In an industry where the term 'veteran' is bandied about far too freely, Colin Curtis is the real deal! His DJing career goes all the way back to legendary Northern Soul club The Golden Torch in the late 60s. In the 70s, he was a resident at Blackpool Mecca alongside Ian Levine, where he became one of the first DJs to introduce the more modern sound of jazz-funk to the scene. By the mid-80s he'd become an early UK champion of house, too, but these days it's on the jazz-dance scene that he's most revered - and here he serves up a 26-track connoisseur's collection that shows why. Ranging from straight-up jazz and soul to soulful house and leaning heavily towards the Afro- and Latin-flavoured, some of these cuts are recent offerings, some date back as far as the 70s, but on jazz-dance floors, all will go down a treat.
They've yet to make as much of an impact in the northern hemisphere but Melbourne-based outfit Mildlife are big news Down Under - their last (second) album 'Automatic' went Top 10 nationally in 2020, and won the ARIA award for Best Jazz Album to boot. Now they're back with long player #3, 'Closer', and it showcases a sound that's hard to pin down, with the album as a whole fusing elements of jazz-funk/jazz-fusion, Balearica, cosmic disco, psychedelic pop and modern indie, and even straying close to ambient territory on the title track. With the tempo seldom rising above walking pace ('Musica' being the only exception), there are no obvious dancefloor moments here - instead, it's an album that's best served whole, when in a mellower frame of mind...
Brandon Weems and Craig Handfield are a pair of DJ/producers from New York, who've been putting on their Coloring Lessons parties since 2018 and have since launched a label of the same name. Here, though, they come to BBE Music with a cut that, with its fusion of Afro, jazz and soul elements, could perhaps only have come from the city that birthed Body & Soul. If the laidback, rolling beats of the Original aren't quite doing it for you then maybe Shannon Harris' A Love For Joy Journey Mix, with its fat funk bassline, spoken word intro and "party!" chants will, while an Instrumental Mix completes the package.
Back once again with the rework masters, as Jalapeno bosses Skeewiff drop the latest instalment in a series of covers/re-edits/homages that's been released in dribs and drabs over the past nine months. The new addition this time out is their take on 1954 Dean Martin classic 'Sway', though if our ears don't deceive us - bearing in mind that there are at least 67 different recordings of the song! - it's actually the 1959 Rosemary Clooney version that's referenced here. Elsewhere on the EP, their takes on lounge classics from The Winstons, Herb Alpert, Dick Dale, Jimmy Smith, Keith Mansfield and The Young Holt Trio return.
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