Online And Looking Good: Sweet As Soul Sugar

Jimmy McGriff: Dig On It and The Now Thing
From: Soul Sugar [Capitol, 1971]

Oh, hey, how you doing? Apologies to all of you who have been clicking here to get a music fix and instead been offered lotions for unsightly pimples but, as is the way with all matters electronic, things took a little longer than planned to resolve (there's nothing like trying to fax photocopies of birth certificates to foreign countries to brighten up your office day).

There are actually some pretty epic posts in the works (including a long planned post on golden era UK hip hop for the 3 fans of it) but I've been so tied up getting the site back that they're still unfinished and getting back online today has caught me as much by surprise as anyone.

However, there's no way I could celebrate being back without a tune or two and, as luck would have it, I always keep a couple of albums I'm considering posting about on my (t)rusty Mp3 player. Therefore I'm delighted to offer the music of Jimmy Mcgriff's Soul Sugar for you today.

Widely recognised as one of the true peaks of the soul jazz albums of the seventies, this grooves as hard as anything out there. It's like Jimmy sat down and said: "You know what? I have no interest in beating round the bush on this one, it's just got to be funky". Well, maybe not, but you get the idea (give me a break, I'm freestyling this here).

Dig On It encapsulates everything I like about funky organ tracks in it's three minute playing time. Starting with the epitome of a funky riff the track fits straight into the groove with Jimmy's trademark organ sound flitting in and out over the (sadly uncredited) band's rhythms.

The Now Thing features more bass and percussion loveliness from Jimmy's band with a heavier focus on the brass instruments. Jimmy once again displays his love of finding a great groove and exploiting it to the maximum. This is music that can't help but brighten your day.

Oh yeah, shout out to the cover designer for taking on the Ohio Players at their own game with that image as well. "Oh my" doesn't really cover it.

Good to be back, enjoy the music.