March: 18 albums you need to hear this month
Daniel Avery, Moby, D Double E and more
Eli Escobar 'Shout' (Classic Music Company)
NYC producer Eli E points his musical and political finger in a particular direction from the start: while previous LP ‘Happiness’ was just that, ‘Shout’ opens with a distorted, disgruntled male voice moaning “ode to America” over keys that Masters At Work would be impressed by (although things get nicely acidic towards the end). After a pretty brief liquid-cool interlude, ‘The People’ is a seven-minute call to arms (“put all the dirty blame on you and me”) which sounds custom-built for The Black Madonna and Artwork alike. There are oodles of great musical moments to savour here, but if we’re going to mention just two more, it’s the deep, after-hour acidic house vibes of ‘Muzik’ and the sun-kissed, 1989-style melodies of ‘Love Inspired’. Ralph Moore
7/10