ERNEST RANGLIN

ERNEST RANGLIN
BELOW THE BASSLINE (1996)
256 KBPS

You may not know it, but you have heard Ernest Ranglin a thousand times before, playing on Millie Small's "My Boy Lollipop" and a dozen classic Prince Buster tracks, cranking the guitar line on ska and roots-rocker tunes for decades. He was there at "the beginning," at the Jamaican pop music revolution of the 50s and 60s, and he's back now. Below The Bassline is a risky endeavor, taking classic tunes like "Congo Man" and "Black Disciples" and reinventing them for the nineties, not as pop-crossover but as true spirited visitations to the great music of the past. Fortunately, he has not only his own formidable skill as a musician, but the equal brilliance of pianist/arranger Monty Alexander and a band that includes Idris Muhammed and Ira Coleman in the rhythm section, and Roland Alphonso on the horns. What they have come up with is a heavy, solid mass that harkens back to Wes Montgomery and then shouts forward to hip-hop and dancehall, with amble homage to reggae and ska, and above all, a searing contemporary jazz that never becomes cheap pop. It's brand new music from classic roots, and above all, it just grooves on and on.

1. Congo Man
2. Surfin'
3. King Tubby Meets The Rockers
4. Satta Massagana
5. 54-46 (Was My Number)
6. Ball Of Fire
7. Black Disciples
8. Bourbon Street Skank
9. None Shall Escape The Judgement
10. Nana's Chalk Pipe
11. Below The Bassline