The Menahan Street Band is part of the Daptone family that includes Sharon Jones & the Dap Kings, the Budos Band and Charles Bradley. The label guarantees a healthy dose of soul, funk, afrobeat and everything that resembles it. Like the Budos Band, the Menahan Street Band operates entirely instrumentally. If the legendary Stax label had a branch in Addis Abeba, that's what their house band would
… have sounded like. A solid backbeat with robust bass lines that provides a traditional soul accompaniment and is supplemented with a not quite flawless playing horn section, a kind of camel funk is created. On the one hand this is reminiscent of the soul of yesteryear and on the other it has common ground with the Ethiopian jazz of Mulatu Astatke. Despite the lack of a vocalist, all songs are written in a song structure. Guitar and keys fill the void in the verses that would otherwise be filled with vocals and the horn section saves its rousing punches for the verses. But what makes The Crossing so interesting are the explorations within the genre, so the album does not get boring quickly. (AD)more
