Luciano ADD

Review

Album Review: Luciano - Deliverance

04/03/2014

by Angus Taylor

Luciano and Mad Professor have delivered

In 2011 Jamaican singer Luciano and UK producer Mad Professor issued a reworking of Dennis Brown’s 1979 Joe Gibbs custodial classic Three Meals A Day. Luciano has been compared to Brown since the start of his career, and Professor was recording other artists doing similar covers at the time (such as Little Roy’s impressive recut of the Wailers’ Caution). Even so, it was remarkable just how much Luciano channelled his hero in voice and spirit.
 
Now, after three years, Luciano and Mad Professor’s vocal and dub showcase is here. It was scheduled for release last winter but put back due to a potential clash with Luciano's album for Al.Ta.Fa.An’s Anthony Senior, Qabalah Man.

Professor’s productions are very smooth and organic. He's travelled to the late 70s era when Dennis was frequently hanging out in London and Professor was a young engineer trying to break into the business. Recorded at Prof’s fourth incarnation of his Ariwa studio in Thornton Heath, it features his long-time musical collaborator Black Steel on guitar bass and keys, Prince Barry on drums and a Jamaican horn section including Rico, Vin Gordon and Dean Fraser.

It begins and ends with Dennis: the thunderous judgemental Deliverance at the start and a more lavish remix of Three Meals A Day at the end. Yet in between, Professor’s rhythms express the soulful lovers side of his nature rather than the wall to wall heavy steppers you might expect.

Flutes flutter and Black Steel’s wah and flange coated guitars caress Luci’s velvet voice into a state of dreamy melt. The dubs have a timeless refinement far distant from some of Prof’s crazier remixes – indulging only in a little squelching Tubbys high pass and some aquatic nods to Scratch. The sleeve claims the project was conceived “in the Gambia where Luciano and Mad Professor were spending some downtime” and Luci sounds at his most relaxed while maintaining his righteousness throughout.

We don't hear much in the way of original songwriting. There are covers of Barbara Mason’s Yes I’m Ready (famously recut by the Heptones as I’m Ready To Learn) and John MacLean’s Lovers rock standard Now You’re Gone. “You’re as mellow as a cello” harmonizes Black Steel on Mellow – which sums up the general mood very well. There’s also a rendition of biblical Psalm 91 over the prancing Stalag rhythm – fusing church and dancehall as one.

Luciano has been outputting strong albums since United States of Africa in 2010. But for all their recent strengths none of them have what this does - a sense of complete unity. That’s because there's no mish-mash of producers: just Luci, Prof and the spirit of Dennis in the room.

It’s been a long time coming but Luciano and Mad Professor have delivered. And if you want more of Luci, singing Dennis in a less English style, stand by for his own executive production with Dean Fraser and others, Honour To the King, coming soon…

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