Sidestepper
Sidestepper is really Richard Blair, the English producer who, while working on location in Colombia for Peter Gabriel's Real World label, fell in love with Salsa's seductive rhythms and decided to stay and explore Bogota's underground music scene. The offspring of this love affair was 1997's Logozo EP, a truly groundbreaking marriage of insistent British drum-and-bass with salsa's brash horns and nagging pianos. The album set the standard for Latin electronica and since then other outfits such as P-18 and Da Lata have followed suit. Now Blair's Sidestepper returns with More Grip, a full-length LP that fully realizes the promise of Logozo.
More Grip marries Salsa's brash energy with the unrelenting rhythmic attack of vintage drum-and-bass. This marriage is so successful that you may not even realize that this isn't straight salsa at first. But start dancing and soon you'll hear the skittering drum patterns and feel the pumped-up bass creeping in and loosening up your lumbar region. Blair employs a full band -- with vocals, horns, percussion, and everything - and tweaks the tracks later in the studio. The result is a rich, full sound that makes "La Bara," "Hoy Tenemos," and "Me Muero" jump right out of the subwoofers and right into your cerebellum. There's a mix of urban cool and vital physicality to Sidestepper that only a truly talented producer could conjure up.
Tom Pryor, CDNOW Senior Editor
CD EP: Sidestepper - Logozo
[22CD001]
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Track Listing:
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Released 1998 on Apartment22. Licenced from Richard Blair 1997. Tracks 2,3 & 5 issued under licence from Deep South Records. Track 1 & 6 written and produced by Richard Blair. All other tracks written and produced by Richard Blair and Ivan Benavides. The original version of Logozo is undoubtably Sidesteppers finest moment.
CDS / 12": Sidestepper - Hoy Tenemos (Right Now)
[PPCD7038-2 / PP127038]
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Track Listing:
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Released 2000 on Palm Pictures. Written and produced by Richard Blair and Ivan Benavides. Addtional remix and production on track 2 by Phillipe Cohen Solal & Christoph H. Mueller (The Boyz From Brazil) and on track 3 by J.K. Whitehouse & Gary Danks. An essential single, with three quality mixes, of which the Funky Lowlives Remix is the best of the bunch. I find the "right now" sample that is used frequently in tracks 1 & 2 to be quite anoying. Thankfully the Funky Lowlives Remix drops the "right now" sample and concentrates on the cheeky Brazillian beats and catchy vocal samples.
Album: More Grip
[PALMCD2049-2]
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Track Listing:
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Released 2000 on Palm Pictures. Written and produced by Richard Blair. "Assembling some of Colombia's finest musicians, Blair has crafted an album that reveals the pulse of two different cultural attitudes. Sidestepper embodies both London, the rich, industrialised and prosperous British capital, and Bogota, the enormous Latin American city which is still in need of the most basic development. Sidestepper reverberates across cultural boundaries. With Andrea Echeverri (Aterciopelados) and Ivan Benavides (Bloque)."
This is a fantastic album of funky Latino beats, blurring the boundaries between Latin American Salsa and Western dance culture, whilst retaining an air of authenticity. Its a fine balance, more often than not leaning closer to Bogota than London, and hence this albums appeal will probably lie with those with an appreciation of the global dance floor.
Album: 3AM: In Beats We Trust
[PALMBEAT1000]
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Released 4/03 on Palm Pictures. Written and produced by Richard Blair. This second outing from Sidestepper is a more laid back affair compared to 'More Grip', orientated more at the lounge and sofa than the dancefloor. And as Latino-chillout goes, this is about as good as it gets.
Other Info:
For further information on Sidestepper see their official web site.
Also worth seeking out is the Future World Funk Vol.1 compilation, which features the excellent Sidestepper track 'Logozo'.
