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Big Heat
At The Heart

HULA 1000 Hours

CD album | gg359
Hula were founded in Sheffield in 1981. Three members (Mark Albrow, Alan Fish and Ron Wright) lived with Stephen Mallinder (Cabaret Voltaire) and Paul Widger (They must be Russians, Clock DVA, The Box) in a villa called Hula Kula. After trying the bass players Alan Watt and Chris Brain (Tense, NOS) Hula recorded the impressive debut album Cut From Inside with Mark Brydon (Chakk, Moloko). Ingredients like cut ups, steady rhythms, and paranoia vocals blended together into a unique white funky sound. Murmur was the band's second album and came out on Red Rhino in 1984. This was also the time of Hula's great singles - Fever Car, Get the Habit and Walk on Stalks of Shattered Glass were all released around that time. In 1986, a more ambient sounding live album was released: Shadowland. The same year saw the release of 1000 Hours - a specially priced double album containing a live concert from Amsterdam, and a whole LP full of new songs, partially recorded in The Netherlands, and partially in the band's hometown Sheffield. As usual, this was remastered by Martin Bowes for this first ever release on CD. Full tracklist: 1. Big Heat 2. Sour Eden 3. Hothouse 4. At The Heart 5. Big Car (Both Ways) 6. Bribery And Winning Ways 7. Gelsomina 8. Marnixstraat 9. The Yesman 10. Bad Blood 11. Hour By Hour 12. Ghost Rattle 13. Jump The Gun 14. Baby Doll 15. Hard Stripes 16. Invisible 17. Ambient ☐2 18. Tear Up. Price: € 18,-/copy incl. worldwide shipping.

W segmencie zatytułowanym To Wind You Up znajdujemy same mocno rytmiczne nagrania. To transowy electro-funk Big Heat i Sour Eden, ale też bliski jazzowym eksperymentom Hothouse oraz sięgający po tribowalową rytmikę At The Heart. Muzykę pozbawioną tanecznej energii zawiera z kolei rozdział To Wind You Down. Składające się nań cztery nagrania to fascynujący przykład infekowania ambientu różnymi wpływami: industrialnymi preparacjami (Big-Car), rozedrganymi cut-upami (Bribery & Winning Ways) czy zgiełkliwym dubem (Marnixstraat).
(Nowa Muzyka, December 2021)

The album is certainly a shifting and varied proposition - we move gloomy throb bass, churning electro textures, baying synth horns, and chanted male vocals of Hothouse. Onto the runaway drum machine, densely layered samples opening of Big Car (Both Ways) which opens up into a hazy sonic landscape of reverberation piano keys, hiss and knocking hand percussion and woozy Muzak. We have tick-tack ethnic dance beats meets bobbing bass, wavering string and shouty vocals of Hour By Hour. Theres pulsing-yet-crude techno stab meets wailing guitar and awkwardly darting funk bass of Jump The Gun. Or the snapping electro beats meet sinister wow-wow guitar shimmers and looped vocal chant chaos of Invisible which later adds in wonky organ and synth horn tones.
(Musique Machine, April 2022)