Road workhorses Galactic have continually built their ever-expanding bag of New Orleans groove-ridden funk and soul into an endless caravan of road-tested live experimentation. With Ruckus, Galactic’s fourth studio release, the bayou six-piece built their own comfy studio – with just a neat mixture of the best and new vintage gear to take their brand of organic jazz, funk and soul to the next level, by improvising over loops and samplers and sequencers into a more song structured effort. In an attempt to make the album more hook friendly and lose the meandering ass shaking noodles, the group enlisted the help of producer Dan “The Automator” Nakamura, known for his enduring work of pushing the boundaries of hip-hop and electronic music, amongst the likes of Beck, John Spencer Blues Explosion, and Gorillaz.
The results are thirteen tracks in about 44 minutes, just about the amount of time for front man – Theryl “The Houseman” DeClouet to take the stage during a Galactic live performance. Houseman makes his presence known immediately on
Ruckus where his aggressive, yet colorful style has finally proved to be a worthy fit into Galactic’s sound, rather than a dagger into their instrumental fires. Instead of opening the album, with a patented Galactic sax melody, “Bittersweet” greets the listener with a grinding force of bass, drums, samples-with Houseman declaring threateningly “touch me once and you’ll be struck by lightning.” “Bongo Joe” incorporates a scratchy blues tune benefiting from a nasty harmonica line from Ben Ellman, that spills a fore-boding, yet bouncy aura leading into the 70’s tinged “The Moil.” The band sweats back to their more jazzy roots with “Uptown Odyssey” a catchy breeze with upbeat vocals, which might actually have “radio potential.” Perhaps the only sour note, is the band’s dire cover of General Public’s 80’s ditty – “Tenderness,” but the upswings that surround are cool enough to let even this tiny mistake slide.
As always the star of Galactic is drummer Stanton Moore, who continually helps to redefine his role of music’s top funk/groove drummer, by laying more inventive hip-hop and electronic oriented beats within a texture of samples. Ben Ellman wins the team player award, by playing less of the sax and orchestrating more sonic elements via programming on ProTools, dropping along a more electronic feel, to add together with his poignant harmonica bursts. Meanwhile guitarist Jeff Raines has set aside much of his shy funk scratching for a more ballsy guitar effort that helps to make the album a glorious Ruckus.
