I recently re-watched the BBC TV series Detectorists for the third of fourth time. It's such a wonderfully twee British comedy-drama about the most mundane of people and things and celebrates the everyday lives of the average Joe in such an engaging and simple way. It's written by Mackenzie Crook and stars him alongside Toby Jones as two Detectorists, the blokes who do the metal detecting around England's sodden fields, looking for Saxon gold and Viking hordes but ultimately finding tin cans and ring pulls. It really is my cup of tea and I'd recommend it to everyone, being fully aware that it might be the wrong brew for some but do give it a go, series one is available on Netflix and I hope you find it as lovely and engrossing as I have.
Among the myriad of reasons why I love the show is because it boils down to men and their hobbies. Along the years I've fluttered between so many hobbies and collected so many thing, only for the majority of them to find their way boxed up in a cupboard, down the garden shed or under the stairs in my Mam's house. I've got some sort of collecting urge that has always been a bit of a man's thing and has seen me collecting pebbles in the playground at school to vinyl records in the dusty basements of record shops all over the place. As Toby Jones' character Lance says in the show; "Men have hobbies and women don't understand them, it's the way it's always been ... how many women commit to an afternoon reorganising their vinyl in alphabetical order?".
This man certain has committed many an afternoon to such a thing and it looks like another is on the cards what with the state it's all looking in at the moment. My record collection is organised by genre rather than alphabetically (of course, who'd be stupid enough to organise alphabetically - although that's a debate that probably rages across many a dark, vinyl-enthusiast forum). I start off with modern psych; we're talking Tame Impala, The Horrors, some Slowdive, before moving briefly through Turkish and Middle Eastern psych and into Brazil's rich musical scene. Their fantastic culture of solo singers moves me into singer-songwriters before a brief foray into punk and reggae. Next is the biggest and fastest growing section - Nigerian music, primarily Nigerian highlife music. It's a genre of music that I stumbled into but have found ever more reason to stay and discover more.
As you become interested in a new hobby or a new part of a hobby, you snuffle up all details about it; gorging on podcasts, tucking into Youtube videos and munching through books as if you were at an all you can eat buffet. Soon you discover the experts in the field, those you can go to for all your knowledge needs and then discover all the key players, those who make your hobby worth your time.
Talkin' Bass Experience by Keni Okulolo combines these two things. Originally recorded at Nigeria's EMI studios in 1974, Hot Casa Records represent the experts who are introducing me to this LP by reissuing this disco funk hidden gem. Keni Okulolo is one of those key players, a highly revered bassist, but another is Odion Iruoje, the producer at EMI in Lagos who produced this LP. You soon come across Iruoje's name if getting into Nigerian music from the '70s. Iruoje worked on many of Fela Kuti's tracks along with putting his unique approach to production on some of the best Afro Rock tracks. He was influenced by his training at Abbey Road studios in London alongside legendary producer George Martin and Iruoje used the production stage as an instrument itself, trying to move away from just capturing a live performance as had been the norm at this time in Nigeria.
The LP is a funk riddled groove with Okulolo's bass hooking everything in and some killer horn arrangements keeping everything groovy and dance-inducing. The raw funk failed to make much of an impact in 1974 and the original pressings of the album now fetch high price tags if a copy is ever found for sale. Thanks to Hot Casa Records, the funk lives on. Check out their website for some sound clips and more information.
Keni Okulolo
Talkin' Bass Experience
Hot Casa Records
Vinyl out: 26/08/2016 at deejay
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