Chris Thomas King Angola review

 

ANGOLA by Chris Thomas King 2020

When an album is named after a notorious US prison, and the first thing you hear as the needle drops is a crowd chanting "George Floyd, George Floyd" to a background of police sirens and rumbling guitar, you know there's a lot of anger here. And anger doesn't always translate into approachable art. 

Fortunately, there's a lot more here than anger; there's pity, and, in a brilliant cover of Dylan's I Shall Be Released, compassion. The Dylan connection is also relevant in that Dylan himself recorded Hurricane, a song that also challenged the institutionalised  racism that we know as the US of A. 

This is not Johnny Cash at Folsom or BB King at Sing-Sing, this is an altogether different event. The album begins, as already noted, with a mash of real-world noises, hip-hop sensibilities and created music centreing on the brutal viral story of George Floyd and moves into a rendition of the US national anthem where CTK channels Hendrix to remind us of Woodstock's famous deconstruction of the Vietnam war. People still, CTK reminds us, have to face off with the Man, the system that dehumanises every one of us, especially people of colour.

Next up is Drenched With Our Blood; in fact just looking at the album's tracklist tells you what's going on here:

 

 

 

 

 

But it's not all doom and gloom. In CTK's hands this becomes an existential crisis full of pathos: 

Why do we do this to each other? What happened to respecting our common humanity? 

In this context, I Shall Be Released is transformed from a moving song about an individual to a song of hope for humankind. In this year of lockdowns and terrors it wells up in our chests and becomes a song of hope for us all.

[swazifiction, October 2020]

Abbey Road review

Abbey Road as 'replayed and reconstructed' by Sand, Water & Wind. A review by Swazifiction.

If you're a purist you need not apply. Indeed, if you're a Beatles fan -- and especially if you're a fan of the original Abbey Road -- listening to this CD could make you cry. If, on the other hand, you're sitting at your favourite table in your favourite seaside café, sipping a cocktail whilst gazing at the sun sinking down across the surface of the sea, then this might be an album for you. This is the Beatles not so much 'reconstructed' as deconstructed into jazz lounge, a literal café del mar package. It's not very engaging anywhere, which is good because it's not very good anywhere (at times it's actually bad) but the tunes are familiar enough to be hummable. Gone is Lennon's angstful wail for existential release on I Want You, gone is McCartney's alcoholically raw voice on Oh Darling, the harmonies, the hooks, the guitars, the inventive drumming, the rock... everything that made the Beatles such a great group and this such a great album, in fact. But, as I said, if you're in that café, this release works in its own limited way. Mine will be a dacquiri with a slice of lime please. No ice.