UK garage: blink and it'll have changed. So much so in fact: what is garage anymore? Zed Bias and Injekta's brand new hi-tech funk project Phuturistix certainly asks that question.
Zed Bias is well known for his UKG beats - sometimes breaky, often 2steppy sometimes vocal, always bassy. But following on from last years' broken beat-meets-2step project as Maddslinky, Injekta and Zed have feasted on black music's vast heritage, absorbing soul, funk and jazz. Hints of deep house, techno and jungle also sneak through.
Enlisting an army of talented singers (Mr J, Jenna "UnCut" G, Amma, Nicky Prince and Anthony Brisset) and musicians (keyboard wiz Atjazz, horn player Kevin "Jazz Warriors" Robinson, string arranger Pete Whitfield and more) 'Feel It Out' is an ambitious live project. It's a quantum leap beyond the army of standard studio beat scientists: they're going back to the Phuture.
The result is a broad and accomplished LP, part soothing soul, part twisted funk. It navigates that tricky balance between live songs and percussive, club-orientated beats. 'Beautiful' is a Jenna G master-class, that in the hands of another singer, or indeed pair of producers, would be tepid and tedious. Here it soars.
By contrast 'Thelonious Punk' is how Carl Craig's cosmic Detroit Experiment project might re-imagine jazzy 2step. Phazers are most definitely set to stun. '@random' is dark and dank off-key funk. 'Bad Thoughts' is no lighter a place.
'Give It A Miss Lads' is that rarest of things - a genuinely funny skit - featuring MC Juiceman and Simba's vain attempts to transgress a Neanderthal bouncer's threshold.
Best of all, the album works as a complete whole. From light to dark, tender to hard, funk to soul: it takes you there. Come imagine the Phuture.
by Martin Clark