Search - African Head Charge :: Drastic Season

Another strong and unique release from a neglected band

Allan MacInnis | Vancouver | 10/29/2000

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Listening to the first song on this disc as I type... There are strange noodling keyboards, twangs on what sound like a sitar or some other Indian stringed instrument, and Bonjo's hand drumming coming from at least three sources, all layered-together and echoing, gradually building in intensity... Why don't people seem to appreciate these guys? This is great music for avant-pop-post-modernist-weirdos; sewn together from culturally diverse sources, but sounding unlike any other single group I can name, African Head Charge take the ball Eno and Byrne threw on the BUSH OF GHOSTS CD and run with it. (Second cut is playing; they seem to have sampled a pig grunting, or maybe that's just some instrument I don't recognize). Note that this is NOT my favorite AHC disc; the things I liked about their abstract and loose second release, ENVIRONMENTAL STUDIES, seem a little overdone here. But it's great music no less. There is no reason these guys should be being neglected, as they seem to be. Note: don't get excited when you read that these are ECDs; the data track is a discography of On-U sound, an Adrian Sherwood interview, stuff like that -- no videos of the band or so forth, at least not that I've been able to open."