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I’ve been working on a long piece about a Northern Soul compilation that I hold in very high regard, but after I posted that video yesterday afternoon I suddenly was pulled into an impossibly deep vortex of 90s Atlanta Bass and have been oscillating violently in the treble vacuum of its truly chill gravity well since. Naturally, I’m referring to the undeniable mind-control rollerskate jams emanating from the depths of SO SO DEF BASS ALL-STARS: VOL. 1 & VOL. 2, two juggernauts of trill breaks that undoubtedly set the stage for countless steamy house parties in the mid 90s and now stand as sonic snapshots of this heady pre-Crunk period when Lil’ Jon was just an awkward little dude with giant eyes, long, long before his Faustian transformation into a diamond-encrusted midget cyborg cursed to a fate of walking around ten-story all-lucite bars in Manhattan handing people free Thai Stick from a Hefty bag until the end of time…indeed, don’t get it twisted, these records are not mere bullshit compilations of successful “Bass DJ” singles, they’re long-playing club banger footlockers designed to soundtrack the party the whole way through, intended to keep you flipping sides and dropping the arm long after last call…and you could at one time buy them out of Jermaine Dupri’s trunk, which is unquestionably gnarly.

But I’m digressing, I guess—though it’s true “My Boo” is the ethereal mindfuck of a block party siren song that brought us down here together (and, indeed, was so successful on its own that Vol. 2 includes a remix,) both discs offer up a bounty of panic-button party starters certain to set all awkward asses to rock—Streaming above is Zae’s epic “Thyow (Thigh),” which plays out boy-girl parking lot boppin’ over a quintessential Bass Beat, all sixteenth snares and stabs of Casio keys…Playa Poncho’s “Let It Burn” splays out languid verse mourning endless blunt roaches while in the backseat the beat prays hallelujah to Too Hard To Swallow…Virgo’s “Slick Partna” is a deftly coy lady’s internal debate about heading home with a stranger set to arpeggiated ticking-clock keyboard melody and girl-group choral chant over bare 808 swing…Volume 2 also includes INOJ’s “Love You Down,” another monolith of middle school auditorium awkward-grind-megamix standard that reaches a near-Motown level of subversiveness in delivering its older-manfriend/younger-ladyfriend lyrical over mysteriously zesty drum machine that rides steady, pure sub-zero bass tones rattling trunks the whole way through.

Elizabeth Archer & The Equators - “Feel Like Making Love” 45
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Must give thanks to my genuine third-eye soul sherpa Mike Murphy of WRIR’s MELLOW MADNESS for this one, a humid, bouncy trumpet-and-keyboard-led Roberta Flack cover cruising atop impeccable dub rhythm that immediately sets heavy, mysterious mood. Perfect for a humid afternoon in spring, windows open all afternoon for the first time, cobwebs swinging in time with a sticky breeze, horns on the street bouncing from asphalt and brick to meet the upper register on the off beats…Absolutely can’t-miss. The B-side of the single is, naturally, a DUB VERSION, which is equally as powerful in Galactic Chill Factor. Both are included here.

Recorded on a shoestring budget in a cramped tenement “Clubhouse” with the intention of acting as the Gang’s “Theme Song,” intended to be blasted from box radios throughout their ever-growing turf, GHETTO BROTHERS - POWER FUERZA! is an instant favorite — a hidden platter of perfect, fuzzy AM-dial latin garage dug out from under a legendary mountain of sketchy dealings between Record Label People, a sonic blast of ballsy salsa-funk sound from the South Bronx’s largest youth gang during those raw, pre-hip-hop years that continue shaping our reality through the unbreakable thread of distant, cosmic cultural coincidence.

But please, don’t take my word for it when I say that this record deserves your full attention through and through, listen and discover as it ceaselessly delivers unfuckwithable jam in the unlikely places where so many others fail — for example, a song like “Girl From The Mountain,” where (given the lyrical content and melody) a more white-bread group desperate for AM play would have almost certainly have wallowed in Leonard Nimoy-esque schmaltz and stringly Tony Orlando instrumentation before asphyxiating in the deep mire of warbly optigan outro, the Ghetto Brothers soar above expectation with a deep latin bridge en espanol and earnest teenage melody that strains and struggles but holds spitefully in the face of pubescent anatomical logic and embeds itself deep, deep into one’s subconscious mind until it bleeds over into your every waking moment.

I didn’t mean for that to sound so scary. Really — it’s just that good. Listen to “Girl From the Mountain” above, and download the full album here.