Scruffy Soul Recordings has been putting out slow jammed, funky concoctions like you’d find nowhere else.
A joint effort between Secret Soul Society and The Found Sound Orchestra (UK and Australia respectively), Scruffy Soul Recordings strive at releasing retro Funk, Hip Hop, Trip Hop, Disco hybrids and has celebrated its first successes with The Kyoto Connection EP and Scruffy Soul EP002 with Chuggin Edits.
Here we have six scruffy souled gems, all condensed into EP form.
The Found Sound Orchestra opens with the dialed back As We Travel, which is an incredible soulful 80 BPM bundle of jazzy goodness.
Almost Trip Hop in its core this jazz tinged opener sets the perfect ambience from the first drop of the beat.
Jules Brennan‘s Blue Morpho ups the tempo to 110 BPM and mixes up a improv laden discoball of jazz and funk, perfectly switching between these audio universes.
Secret Soul Society‘s Give Me Courage launches a completely different soundscape, swooning with ambient pads, fx-heavy blips and blops echoing in this dubbed out open space of loops and high-altitude airiness.
A breezy patch of weird and delightful improvisation, of which Secret Soul Society is a cunning master.
The Found Sound Orchestra‘s Makin’ Babies is a fun and clever blend of Soul and infomercial with another sophisticated twist and bending of genres and conventions.
Motowny vocals are just a delight and help materialize this cloudy ball of fuzziness.
Jules Brennan‘s second offering on the EP is the delightful Paragon Of Bliss. Think movie score with added improv jazz. Dramatic, driven and über-cool.
Swelling strings, vibraphone and piano licks create a thick atmosphere of slick coolness.
Secret Soul Society closes the EP with the 106 BPM Souled out I’ve Just Got To Say. Again, the dubby playful approach, which is a trademark of Secret Soul Society, ends the EP with a upbeat fragilité of improvised grooves which materialize as dreamy clouds of sound.
This is a headphone excursion of the finest making. Scruffy Soul Recordings are going places, which begin where dreams and creativity meet and conjoin.