Helping to celebrate 30 years of Asian Dub Foundation 94-Now Collaborations does what it says in the title, collecting several of the band's collaborations with special guests, or tunes they were asked to re-mix, onto one LP to demonstrate what a special band Steve Chandra Savale, Deeder Zaman, Nathan Flutebox Lee and the crew have produced during the last 30 years.
The album opens with No Fun ft Iggy Pop that takes this classic in a Bhangra punk direction! The collaboration came about after Iggy approached them at a festival in Zagreb, telling them he thought it was going to be difficult to follow them live!! Of the 200 plus versions I own of this song, this one goes in a vastly different direction to most but works totally. Iggy sounds like he's really having loads of fun re-working one of his masterpieces like this.
Coming Over Here ft Stewart Lee is a dank response to the bleating ignorance of racists, listing the different immigrants coming over here, bringing us curries, or epic poetry, fixing our country for us, it's one of Stewart Lee's best known comedy rants, that ADF then married to some spare beats from Nathan Flutebox and had a huge hit with, the skittery Drum and bass backing helping get the point across.
Broken Britain ft Chowerman has a super sharp rap, over Hollywood soundtrack meets super harsh rap rock backing, this crucial message is rammed home by young MC Chowerman ADF found him in East London at Community Music where the band started to give us the 2024 update to this classic early tune.
1000 Mirrors FT Sinead O'Connor & Ed O'Brien has a deep dub feel, Sinead slowly bewitches and teaches us about more smoke and mirrors across the ages, passion and terror become strange bedfellows, we try to stop the horror many women suffer in this dreadful tale about Zoora Shah who was put in prison for finally fighting back against her dreadfully abusive husband.
Raj Antique Song ft Likkle MAI & Dry And Heavy has sylph like vocals telling this tale of the days of the Raj, with pump organ and percussive stripped back backing, helping you to make ancient connections, the tabla's send out a message recorded in Tokyo with local dub masters Dry And Heavy providing the beats.
The B side opens with Ta Deem with Nusrat Fatah Ali Khan, that has a deep dub and Bedouin vibe, the mantra style Qawalli vocals set against rasping guitars and caustic percussion makes a cool juxtaposition.
Culture Move FT MC Navigator has super heavy Asian Jungle dub rap vocals, the tune gets heavier, the heavy message comes across about stopping starvation in all nations.
Free Satpal Ram ft Primal Scream (Brendan Lynch Mix) tells the terrible story of Satpal Rams imprisonment for 17 years for a crime he didn't commit, this tune was part of the campaign to raise awareness and free him, the deep dark rap tale helping to free the innocent, this mix has scratching doom dub edge and little sign of Bobby Special Guest till near the end.
Toulouse ft Zebda & Chandrasonic with carnival road march drumming, vocals with loads of effects and panning, this needs a full-on Bollywood dance routine to go with it, they help bring this legendary french rapper to a wider non Francophile audience.
Black Steel In The Hour Of Chaos ft Chuck D recorded live at Somerset House the old Inland Revenue offices, this sounds close to both Public Enemy and the Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy, but with an Asian twist as the evil of 9/11 and other tragedies are rapped about by Chuck D.
Collective MODE FT Audio Active mixes Asian influences as the Japanese dub weaves into the Indian dub, this has strings totally connecting rap from to acts that toured together and collaborated to make sure the shows had a shared unity of purpose.
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