Reverend Soundsystem (Reverend and the Makers)
With massive beats and a booming bass, RSS are shaking the room, soundtracking the 21st century. The collective are out on tour making music that is a cut up of all the great underground sounds that are everywhere in the modern, fractured British music scene. A musical bit of this and a bit of that rolled up and smoking is what British street music sounds like now- a fractured rush of beats, bass and guitar tunes coming out of bed-sit windows and cranked car stereos. The music is everywhere and a future-musician navigates this thrilling see saw of sound with an open mind and an adventurous spirit.
Blowing the myth that music is not going forwards, RSS are not only re-writing the script, they are re-wiring just what modern music is. They are navigating the cutting edge of the dance underground and bringing it back to the indie nation like the Roses and the Mondays once did with acid house and The Specials did with SKA. This is at the core of all great music and this is the fusion 21st century styles.
The digital that interests RSS is pushing forwards- stalking the furthermost points of possibility and it’s no mistake that in 2010 some of the most groundbreaking music is coming from the sheer possibilities provided by the technological. Along with MIA, RSS represents the radical mainstream fringe getting to grips with the endless rush of new sounds out there.
They make a heavy, heavy sound but they are not pure noise, this is a party. The beats are superbly kinetic and live are quickly pumped into dance action. On top RSS and their charismatic Cohort, Matic, deal out the lines in tough northern brogue, MCing the whole show and driving the audience to a frenzy.
RSS is the sound of the real UK- the mash up of cultures and noise that makes up the real Saturday nights just beyond the chain bar hell of the city centres. This is the result of the melting pot mixture of music on the streets that is a million miles away from the jangling indie world of the mainstream media.
RSS have Drafted in Co-Writers Jimmy Welsh and Cory Kilduff (From Trans Atlantic Tech House Duo Ocelot) as well as Jagz Kooner Ex Sabres of Paradise (whom has created Remixes for everyone from Massive Attack to Kasabian and Primal Scream as well as working with Andrew Weatherall on Sabres Of Paradise) The Ranks are further bolstered by Sheffield MC Matic and Reverend & The Makers Keyboard/Vocalist Laura Manuel and feature guest appearances from Kano, Blak Twang and Roots Manuva.
Their journey is the real sound of the suburbs, the real soundtrack to modern UK- the sound of a million car stereos, crackling iPods and mobiles, the heavy bass colliding with the trad indie love of the song is a hypnotic potion and this makes them a very powerful beast indeed.
John Robb – Manchester England
