http://www.starnewsonline.com/article/20100210/COLUMNIST/100219994/1050
John Brown's Body adds hip-hop, club flair to reggae sound
Star-News
02.10.10
By John Staton
Reggae is music rooted in the past, but John Brown's Body is determined to take it into the future.
The Boston-based eight piece, which is coming to Wilmington for a Valentine's Day show at Diesel, terms its sound “future roots” or “progressive reggae.”
“We have traditional aspects of our music, like drum and bass and a full horn section,” said Tommy Benedetti, who's been with the band since it formed in the mid-'90s. “But what goes on top of it and the lyrical content and our overall approach to our instruments and our sound is something that we've carved out and created our own little world.”
It wasn't always that way. For close to a decade John Brown's Body hewed to a more or less traditional roots reggae sound. But after the death of their bass player, Scott Palmer, in 2006, several members left the group and Benedetti and original singer Elliot Martin decided to take things in a new direction.
It's still a recognizably reggae sound with familiar reggae rhythms, but many other elements, some of them unexpected, creep into the densely layered music. There's a strong hip-hop flavor to the vocals, and while the lyrics mine familiar reggae themes like standing up for yourself and fighting oppression, the sound has an undeniably modern, almost club flair that's right at home on the dance floor.
Fans responded to the band's new sound. Their 2008 album “Amplify” (Easy Star Records) debuted at No. 1 on Billboard's reggae chart and opened John Brown's Body up to a whole new fan base. They recently completed their first tours of the UK and New Zealand.
No doubt being on a progressive label, Easy Star Records, has helped. The label's namesake, The Easy Star All-Stars, who played a show in Wilmington last year, drew attention for their most recent album, a reggae-style remake of The Beatles' “Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band.”
John Brown's Body pushed its music further into the future when it turned over “Amplify” to producers from around the world, who remixed it into a new album, “Re-Amplify,” that again cracked the reggae Top 10. The band even reworked some of the songs from “Amplify” for its live show based on the remix versions.
“It was something I wanted to see us do for a while,” Benedetti said. “It's so nice to let go and give it up. Recording can be stressful and meticulous.”
When he heard the first remixes, he was heartened: “There it was, and it sounded crushing.”
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