SugaRush Beat Company they can take you higher
March 2nd, 2008, 1:04 am Hobbies Ideas
The notion of an international soul supergroup may conjure up images of spoilt
playboys with more air miles than sense. Far removed from such
self-conscious fabulousness, step forward three experienced Alist musicians
with the nous to make SugaRush Beat Company the most exciting soul-rock
alchemists since Sly and the Family Stone.
Based respectively in Copenhagen, Los Angeles and Richmond, Surrey, this
improbable Danish-American-Australian agglomeration has influences that are
almost as widespread as their addresses. They served early notice of their
singular ability to parlay church backgrounds into a killer modern gospel
track on an iTunes single of the week late last year, Oh Lord (Take Me
Back). Their album, due in the summer, fills in all the colours of that
outline, mixing old-school testifying and sensuous soul with psychedelic
guitar. The sound is a restorative plink-plink-fizz that should make the
likes of OutKast, Gnarls Barkley and even Prince examine their laurels.
The vocal spearheads of the project are Ida Corr, the Danish singer on Fedde
Le Grand%26rsquo;s huge club hit Let Me Think About It, and Rahsaan Patterson, who
makes R%26amp;B albums for the excellent British label Dome. The sonic glue is
dispensed by the Aussie producer-turned-Surrey resident Jaz Rogers, whose
recent credits include sessions for what may, in her own sweet time, become
the next album by Lauryn Hill.
SugaRush Beat Company have heard the artistic comparisons, but there%26rsquo;s no
sense of competitiveness in their laid-back demeanour. Unless that%26rsquo;s the jet
lag kicking in. They%26rsquo;re all amazing artists, I love them all, Corr says,
smiling sweetly. It%26rsquo;s all the same [musical] information, Patterson adds.
It%26rsquo;s not like one group or person woke up and said, %26lsquo;Let me create this.%26rsquo;
Depending on when you%26rsquo;re resonating, you pick up pieces. Before Prince,
there was Little Richard and Jimi Hendrix. I%26rsquo;m sure it%26rsquo;s only tiredness
that makes him forget to namecheck a certain godfather, too.
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