The follow up to a debut that grabbed critics by the heart and shredded it before them with such genre-ripping abandon that we stood breathless and unable to speak for days, Brighton’s Blackgrass return with ‘A Hundred Days In One’. Having already have drawn the blood of a good word from the likes of Groove Armada, X-Press 2, Mr Scruff and Quantic, Black Grass (aka Mex) are all set to perform open-heart surgery again with an album that morphs shamelessly from snazzy latin sambas (‘Lucha Contra De La Injusticia’) groovy party dub (‘Oh Jah ft Jah Marnyah’), funk, soul and some steamy ninja raps (‘Lines Of Defence’, ‘Down and Dirty’, ‘Don’t Try’).
Again, it’s a fairly mellow and cosmopolitan affair, and again what it gains in variety it loses in impact, the album ping-ponging from one genre to another without getting a chance to flow, the sum of the many parts failing to engender a pleasing whole.
Includes surprise summer hit: ‘Don’t Leave Me This Way’ featuring Dominque Noiret.