Sometimes
it pays to be educated in the art of punctuation! On doing
some research for this review I left out the colon in the
group's name and found myself just about to write about a
group from Jakarta, Indonesia with the same (coloness)
name! SOUL: ID in fact hail from Africa but found their
musical home to be in Brussels where they spent nearly 3
years putting this debut album together. It has in fact
been around for a while with the Japanese in particular
promoting this soulful gem since 2007, but sometimes we 'soulboys'
prefer to look farther afield at new material rather than
explore that which is much closer to home.
Built lyrically around a series of late
night chats between a group of friends 'Sex, Love and
Philosophy' is an album of some class with fine
musicianship and equally good production from group
mainstay 'Urban Deep'. All of the music featured is groove
orientated in a two-step style and without exception
instantly likeable. The modern funk of 'Believe' lays the
scene of what is to come with tracks such as 'Even Enough'
and 'Tender' coming straight out of the Stevie Wonder
songbook for influential melodies!
The group's first single 'Love of my
Life' is a hypnotic groove that comes with one of those
catchy riffs that buries itself in your brain for weeks.
In truth though the album is full of them and most could
well become classics to play well after the album's sell
by date. This foursome have talent covering the wide
genres of the music that we love and are able to make it
all accessible to an even wider audience. The
group's sound has been dubbed 'Afropean' I would just
prefer to just call it quality soul with a capital Q.
