Jessica Lauren: "Film" (Melt 2000)
Film is a bewitching collection of pointers and signals to what's happening out in that far leftfield where dance idioms and jazz ideals collide. If Jessica Lauren's two previous albums on Soul Jazz were mere ripples, this one is a monster wave of stunning realisations and giddy expectations. While many albums of this nature doodle rather than deliver, Film bowls you over by the very variety of what's to be sampled. A Pearl For Iona and I Love You My Brother may be gentle, mellow dreamscapes where Lauren's piano makes all the moves but Alefala and Treasure Island have a wicked bounce in their stride, the band making their presence known to all. And then there's a track like the closing Coming Home which enters another dimension with its deep, beguiling texture and tone. Expect to hear a lot more about Film and its creator in the months ahead.
Jim Carroll
Various: "ffrr Classics" (ffrr)
The house that British dance doyen and DJ Pete Tong built continues to flourish in a fashion others would find hard to match for a season, let alone the 10 years frr has been open for business. On one hand, ffrr has the ears for that one-off single which will ignite the charts (The Goodmen's Give It Up, Mory Kante's Yeke Yeke or the sheer cheese appeal of Stretch & Vern's I'm Alive). On the other hand, the label can also spot and develop artists like Orbital, All Saints, the Brand New Heavies and Goldie, who will go on to sell albums in their own right. ffrr Classics is a almost a history lesson, not only in how to make and shape a dance label, but also in how the music itself has changed and developed over a decade.
Jim Carroll
Black Star Liner: "Bengali Bantam Youth Experience" (WEA)
Black Star Liner's second album is an experimental feast. Sharing a common culture but, crucially, not a common sound with such other Anglo-Asian acts as Cornershop and Talvin Singh, BSL take a far more polar approach to their music. Like reaching Massive Attack's Mezzanine but then deciding to go to another floor with the guitars, tracks like Khaatoon are punk rock grooves with much attitude to show. BSL's front-man Choque Husein is an experienced producer and it shows, especially on the recent single Bindi & Superfly, which is far more complex than the dark disco strut it appears to be on first encounter. Despite frequent overpowering guitar surges and Husein's odd vocal interruptions, Bengali Bantam Youth Experience is a bit of a stunner, an album which refuses to be one thing or the other when it can be happily both at the same time.
Jim Carroll
