Mandingo: Black Rite and The Headhunter

Available on: The Sound Gallery, Vol. 1 [Scamp, 1996]

Most Brits around about my age and older will have encountered the sounds of Geoff Love at one time or another, even if they didn’t realise it at the time. A talented musician who had some minor success with his own work, Geoff and his Orchestra spent most of the 60s, 70s and beyond recording disco approximations of hits of the day for BBC records and other library style labels. My own childhood experience of Geoff was a compilation of disco covers of sci fi theme songs (Star Wars was taken to a galaxy that was very very far away) and, slightly later, his rather unique singalong session with the timeless Miss Mills.

At the time this was just a compilation I loved and thought no further but, as I went round friend’s houses and found similar styled LPs in their parents collections, I slowly realised that Love was a solid foundation of any record collection, no matter what your tastes were.

Getting older, the lure of Geoff slowly disappeared and I happily flicked past any thing featuring his name in the small print. Shame on me indeed for I’ve kindly been schooled on what I was missing through a generous gift (thanks Skel) of the really quite stunning Sound Gallery Vol 1 collection.

Widely credited with kicking off the 90’s reappraisal of “lounge” and library music, this compilation features all the recognised great UK names of the scene such as Hawkshaw and Mansfield. However, it was Love’s contributions under the Mandingo moniker which really blew me away.

A bit of background on the impressively tasteless name, in the early seventies the Afro Funk of artists like Fela Kuti and Manu Dibango were proving big hits so EMI commissioned Geoff to get in the studio with a collection of session musicians and churn out some African sounding funk music. What they got instead is a mix of African, funk and big band which is fantastically British in it’s bastardisation.

Anyway, taking all that into account, I defy you not to feel your jaw drop slightly when Black Rite kicks into full gear. Kicking off with a library style mixture of leading brass and big band drums the track appears to be a pleasant little mover but stick with it folks. At 1.15 it’s like the group suddenly remember their afrobeat instructions and the track turns into a fuzzed out, wah wahing, horn parping Bond In Africa. Building layer on layer this is just crazily good. Funnily enough as I just decided to post this on a whim, I think it makes a rather nice accompaniment to Kevin’s Stoned Guitar no?

The Headhunter couldn’t really be more of a pastiche of Dibango without them calling it Soul Makossa V2. However this doesn’t stop it being a great slice of funk with simmering organ, great percussion led melodies and that ever important fuzz and horn lines.

That’s it, I’m back in love with Geoff Love. Now to go raid those bargain bins for all the Orchestra Presents LPs I’ve yet to grab hold of…….

For those interested, my good friend Deji Olukotun made his way to Eugene O’Neill Theater last week to experience Fela! On Broadway. Here is a brief sampling of his account:

… The story begins with the impending closure of The Shrine by the government. It’s as good of a starting point as any other. Fela, played by the Sierra Leonean Sahr Ngaugah, recounts his life through a series of flashbacks, charting the development of his music and remembering the key personalities in his life. We see glimpses of his life in London, his visit to America during the Black Power movement, and his fear of James Brown’s music, which swept through Africa and haunted him, because he both loved it and disliked its lack of African sentiment. We also watch as he meets the first and most influential of his eventual household of twenty-seven wives. He then explains his Afrobeat music by breaking it down instrument by instrument...

[click here for full review]

Sounds like a full success (despite an arguably out of place tap-dancing sequence… ha!) Cool. I’m psyched; it sounds like a great show.

Be back soon with some choice jams of both old and new school varieties.

Fela Kuti & Afrika 70 – Zombie
From: Zombie [Celluloid, 1977]

Fela Kuti & Afrika 70 – Sorrow, Tears, & Blood
From: Sorrow, Tears & Blood [Kalakuta, 1977]

Fela on Broadway Official Site

A few months ago, I received a PR email asking if I wanted to receive some “cool stuff” that might, perhaps, inspire Earfuzz to help spread the word about a new musical coming to town. The show was vaguely described as “an energetic mix of Afrobeat music and African dance, following the life of a famous musician.” Hmm, I thought, sounds Earfuzzy… who could this famous musician possibly be?… of course, it’s Fela Kuti. While I expected it to be Fela, I did harbor a fear it might be a half-baked off off off Broadway production about a fictional composite character based roughly on the life of Fela. Nope. It appears they are going large here and doing their best to channel the spirit of Fela Kuti- the man, the myth, the legend-through the lens of a Broadway musical production. For many reasons, I’m optimistic it will be a killer show… Why?…

Exhibit A - PR mystery box actually contained some “cool stuff”

The contents of the box and more, after the jump.