Karl Hector and The Malcouns – “Unstraight Ahead” – [Now Again Records]

Thurston Hunger   9/4/2014   CD, Soul

KFJC Soul Patrollers jonesing for something made this millenium
feast your ears upon this. There are many onion layers to the
imaginary Mr. Hector, like a good spy movie, it sends you
overseas to the Woima Collective, then a newspaper left on a bench
by the Poets of Rhythm and ultimately JJ Whitefield aka Jan
Weissenfeldt turns up as the mastermind. This has trace elements of
Ethiopique sleaky chic no doubt, “Who’s Fooling Who” with
that throaty sax and snake-doing-jumping-jacks definitely lays
in wait for you. But what about that Otha Turner-style fife funk
on “Transition T” that somewhere along picks up a video game
virus. So much great percussion throughout, “Sharpesville
Massacre” being a, well, *killer* example. My favorite right
now is “Spirit of Gine” with a racing violin scraping the
sky and a little clean guitar pushing the clouds away. Tracks
2,4,12,14 have vocals, “Push Na Ya” with some possible voodoun
Ogun action, while “Ombele” ignites your feet with an Afro
Beat treat. Styles are tried on like fantastic Halloween
costumes, enjoy this excellent release Now and (often) Again!
I bet these songs expand and blow folks away live, they often
feel like a recipe that best cooks when it’s got an audience
interacting and dance-devouring a couple hours.