NEW RELEASES: MANU DIBANGO – AFRICADELIC; MOUNTAIN MOCHA KILIMANJARO – ICHI NI SAN SHI GO ROKU; THE KUTI MANGOES – AFRO-FIRE

MANU DIBANGO – AFRICADELIC  

Incredibly funky work from Manu Dibango – a set that's easily as great as his classic Soul Makossa album – but which is a lot more obscure overall! The work's got a fiercely-jamming quality all the way through – lots of rumbling percussion at the bottom, and also a bit of keyboards as well – served up in a heady brew that turns out to be a perfect setting for Dibango's sharp-edged reeds! The record's got a few especially great break tracks, but all numbers are pretty darn great too – filled with more funky changes, flaring horns, and 70s-styled grooves than you might ever hope to find in a single album! Tracks include "Black Beauty", "Soul Fiesta", "The Panther", "Africadelic", "Moving Waves", "Afro Soul", "Wa Wa", "Percussion Storm", "Monkey Beat", and "Oriental Sunset".  ~ Dusty Groove

MOUNTAIN MOCHA KILIMANJARO – ICHI NI SAN SHI GO ROKU

These guys are really on fire this time around – and turn in one of the most searing performances we've ever heard from a contemporary funky combo! Mountain Mocha Kilimanjaro hail from Japan, and have really earned our attention with their previous funky records – but this time around the really push it over the top, and seem to move with a grit and edge we never would have expected a few years before! Every element in the music is razor sharp, but also a bit offbeat too – so that the keyboards have this fuzzy tone, the guitar this shadowy quality, and the horns this hard-blasting ferocity that's way different than the usual use of the instruments – all qualities that are pushed even further by the album's fresh arrangements and really rich conception of sound. If you thought you'd heard it all from funk groups, you owe it to yourself to check this one out!  ~ Dusty Groove

THE KUTI MANGOES – AFRO-FIRE

An Afro Funk combo, but one who really open up their groove, too – mixing in some great outside instrumentation that still stays close to the roots! The core combo is a sextet with a really firey brace of saxes in the lead – a pair of players, one of whom sometimes shifts to flute – mixed with tight drums, percussion, keyboards, guitar, and a bit of trombone – all with a style that really shows the best merger of deep funk sharpness with older Nigerian styles in recent years. Some cuts add in lots of extra percussion – plus balafon and ngoni as well – and titles include "Fire", "Feeling Good", "Pass It On", "Song For Fela", "Moanin", "Walking Man", "Slowly", and "Something Yellow". CD features bonus remixes of "Fire" and "Song For Fela".  ~ Dusty Groove