BATUCADA SOUND MACHINE – RHYTHM AND RHYME

Batucada Sound Machine are huge. At least in the physical and metaphysical sense – they are certainly strong at a headcount – thirteen members no less, somehow cramming their collective musical talents into one dense, but deftly controlled funk rhythm machine. They possess a clarity of rhythm and sense of the funk that is as infectious as it is bewildering. Ashe introduces us into their crisp, jammy world with a kind of Stone Roses-meets-Funkadelic psyche, showing off the group’s penchant for snappy brass assaults and wa-wa guitars. The tone colours shift as the record goes on – the Caribbean ska-romp Cumbia Del Cambio firmly cements the globe-trotting folk funk journey, and in Hechicera we are treated to a very southern and steamy Copacabana mambo. This group, and this record, in many ways highlight was is potentially stigmatic about the fusion of world music and funk in the modern music climate – but it is delivered with such love, such joy and skill, that it’s nearly impossible not to be moved by the groove.

***1/2