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I might have missed Live In The Earth: Sandoz in Dub Chapter 2 if not for the absolute coincidence, I recently got out the ‘Best Of’ compilation The Golden Moments of Cabaret Voltaire (Rough Trade, 1987). Their classic tracks like ‘Do The Mussolini’ and ‘Obsession’ clearly owed much to Lee Perry/ King Tubby’s dub experimentations of the seventies.

Nearly 30 years on, Kirk is still experimenting with electronic sounds and judging by this latest album, he’s getting better at it. The predecessor to Sandoz in Dub Chapter 2 was also released on Soul Jazz back in 2002, Chant To Jah: Sandoz In Dub. Mr. Kirk has many projects on the go so it’s no surprise the latest edition has taken so long to get into the stores.

To start with, I found the opening track slightly annoying as the “Africa” chant sounded to me like a slurred “Acid House”. It may have been of course, but ‘Acid (Jahsay)’ would have sounded right somehow.

Once over that minor gripe, ‘Monopolize And Destroy’ and ‘Civilisation Means Manner’ have something of the BiggaBush about them (i.e. they are great). Also feelin the ‘Jah, Rastafari’ chant on ‘Strike Free’ that particular rocks and the more spacey downtempo of ‘Thousand Year Dread’.

Kirk has managed to get a big ‘Fat Freddy’s Drop’ brass sound along with some bouncy echoing sythns and made these eight (if only 45 minutes long) tracks highly infectious. You’ll also catch some old skool hip-hop references, which we also like.

But strangely enough, what with the minimal theme of mixes of Damian Lazarus/Matthew Styles on Get Lost and the Other Side Of London / Paris CD’s we’ve covered lately, there’s a common link to this album and the original band, Cabaret Voltaire (also try ‘This Is Entertainment’ and ‘Sluggin’ For Jesus’) even if the lineage is long and twisted and touches other ‘globalists’ like David Byrne and Brian Eno.

Talking of linking up, the Rough Trade shop that features in the DVD of Other Side Of London still has the posters from when the shop opened in the mid 70’s as a punk/reggae store. As someone said to me the other day, referring to this period, “they don’t do good reggae anymore”. Well it might be outta Sheffield rather than the Black Ark but Sandoz can certainly put out a great electro dub album and Live In The Earth is definitely that.

Hectic Mix nomination: Monopolize And Destroy / Sit In Judgement.

Reviewed: Sandoz - Live In The Earth: Sandoz In Dub, Chapter 2 (Soul Jazz Records) Cat. No. SJR CD 130 [Recorded at Western Works Studios, Sheffield, England] Release date: 29 May 2006
Tracklisting
1. Africa (Jahsay) (5:09)
2. Monopolize And Destroy (6:16)
3. Strike Fire (5:58)
4. Civilisation Means Manners (Means Discipline) (5:10)
5. Sit In Judgement (6:33)
6. Spiritual Communication (6:00)
7. I And I Meditation (5:59)
8. Thousand Year Dread (4:19)

Links
www.richardhkirk.com
www.souljazzrecords.co.uk
Cabaret Voltaire
www.roughtraderecords.com
www.biggabush.co.uk