Just to re-cap, Reid has over 40 years experience playing with everyone from Martha Reeves & The Vandellas (notably the classic, ‘Dancing In The Street’), Miles Davis, Fela Kuti, James Brown, Fats Domino, Sun Ra, Peggy Lee, Chaka Khan, Dexter Gordon, Dionne Warwick and many, many more.

The new album follows on from previous albums The Exchange Session: Vol 1 (acknowledged as bit of a difficult affair mainly due to the length of the tracks) and Vol 2. The tracks on Tongues are much shorter and arguably more commercial.

The opening track, ‘The Sun Never Sets’ still sounds the best to me; previously released as a 12” (backed with a James ‘Bass Tool’ Holden remix with a warped ‘Baba O’Reilly’ bit at the end.

The electrocuted ‘Brain’ with a banging headache is definitely not commercial and the gentle ‘Our Time’ is immediate pain relief. John Coltrane and Grant Green have both done jazz versions of ‘Greensleeves’ and the hardly recognisable version on this album is the only non-original track

‘Rhythm Dance’ and ‘People Be Happy’ are both in their free style laptop experimentation meets Reid’s kit with a big beat mode and lots of pots and pans hitting the kitchen sink.

From what Peterson’s played on his show recently, Reid’s solo album, recorded in Senegal last year, sounds excellent so thanks to Hebden and Domino for supporting.

Hectic Mix nominations: ‘The Sun Never Sets’, ‘Rhythm Dance’, Mirrors’

Reviewed: Kieran Hebden And Steve Reid — Tongues Domino Recording Company Ltd. Cat. No: WIGLP189 Release date: March 2007
Tracklisting:
A1 The Sun Never Sets (5:50)
A2 Brain (3:48)
A3 Our Time (5:04)
A4 People Be Happy (4:41)
A5 Greensleeves (2:39)
B1 Rhythm Dance (6:49)
B2 Mirrors (3:10)
B3 The Squid (4:11)
B4 Superheroes (4:19)
B5 Left Handed, Left Minded (4:05)

Links:
www.fourtet.net
www.steve-reid.comwww.kiranhebdenandstevereid.comThe Exchange Session Vol. 1 @ Domino Records
www.matthewdear.com
www.jamesholden.org.uk
www.myspace.com/iamtherealjamesholden
www.eatyourownears.com
www.myspace.com/eatyourownears
Gilles Peterson :: 22nd March 2007 :: Steve Reid In Conversation
Steve Reid & Keiron Hebden — ‘Daxaar’ (Domino)