Future Funk Part 1, Poets Of Rhythm

The Woo Woo’s: Spooky Grinder
From the single [Hotpie & Candy, 1993]
The Whitefield Brothers: Prowlin
From the album: In The Raw [Soul Fire 2002]
The Poets Of Rhythm: Breakdown The Tighten Up (live)
From the EP: Original Raw Soul Tour ‘95 [Soulciety 1995]

Back in the early 90’s unbeknown to most of the world there were some seriously funky rumblings shaking up parts of Germany, and they would stay unbeknown to most for nearly a decade, until a certain ‘DJ Shadow and Co.’ (Lyrics Born) found them and helped release the album ‘Define Discern’, which would then set off beathead’s saliva glands like Pavlov across the globe.

Published by the label soulciety, ‘The Poets Of Rhythm’ released their first album ‘Practice What You Preach’ back in 1993. The LP was raw unadulterated funk, sticking closely to the original vernacular of the music’s style. When hearing the record you could easily be mistaken and think You were listening to some unreleased James brown production, the Poets even got a letter of approval from Bobby Byrd to stick in the liner notes of the album. It was a brilliant record that stuck to the original James Brown funk blueprint from beginning to end.

In 2001, after being head hunted by Quannum’s ‘Lyrics Born’ the band reformed and released ‘Define discern’ on Ninja tune and became well known to many. Their whole style had evolved greatly since the early nineties, the music was still raw and funky but was now deeper with a heavy psychedelic vibe to it. The band are still touring the world and occasionally releasing the odd record here and there. Whatever you do, do not pass up the chance to see them live if you get one.

During the period from 1992 to 2002 the Poets released a string of elusive 45’s all under various guises, fooling many collectors into thinking they were original 70’s pieces of vinyl. Upon listening to these singles you can see how the band perfected their authentic deep funk sound and then pushed the funk envelope into brand new territory, while still maintaining that depth and kinship they had with the original art form.

The single ‘Spooky Grinder‘ was released after the band had finished the album ‘Practice what you preach’. You can here in this track how they have begun to stray from the polished J.B. style of their first LP, in ‘Prowlin‘ which came out only a few years ago you get a great example of where the Poets new direction had taken them too. Finally ‘Breakdown The Tighten Up (live)‘ is a classic example of the band doing their straight up, no messin’ funk, sticking close to James Brown’s original blueprint.

Unfortunetly ‘Spooky Grinder’ and the ‘Original raw soul tour 95′ are long out of print and can only be picked up second hand but, and I highly recommend, ‘In The Raw’ which is still available at most quality Vinyl retailers.