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JIM INGRAM: Drumbeat

pickwick33pickwick33 8,946 Posts
edited October 2007 in Strut Central
Just picked up Jim Ingram's Drumbeat on the Respect label last week. I'd been curious about this album ever since I'd read about it in Rob Bowman's bio of Stax Records, Soulsville U.S.A. (Respect was Stax's "black consciousness" subsidiary). It'd be easy to overlook this album if you didn't know what it was - the cover looks like a generic fusion LP, with its' drawing of a conga drum in the forest - but it's actually an album of caustic, Afrocentric poetry. He's as harsh as the Last Poets (and twice as horny), but he's got an off-the-wall sense of humor like Melvin Van Peebles. The humor is subtle, but it's there (like when he attempts to come up with a rhyming word for "spectrum" in "Black Woman").And another thing Ingram had in common with MVP - the brother couldn't carry a tune in a bucket. He had a slick speaking voice (he was a newscaster for decades on Detroit radio), but on "Walk Around Heaven" he tries to sing and his voice goes flatter than a desktop. And unlike Van Peebles, who surrounded himself with professional background vocalists, Ingram was backed by singers who sounded just as raggedy! I know it sounds terrible on paper, but it's actually endearing on record, much like Van Peebles' singing is...despite all this, it's an interesting album.I know some so-and-so sampled a cut or two, but I don't care 'bout that. Discuss!

  Comments

  • GuzzoGuzzo 8,611 Posts
    I've seen this a couple times and passed it up, once cause it was too pricey (they had it for $40 or so) and the other time just cause I was high as fuck.

    The respect label has been a curiousity to me, all I know on it are a handful of John Kasandra releases and this Ingram LP. did they release any other full lengths?
  • yoigotbeatsyoigotbeats 1,667 Posts
    I felt it for the jawns on it that were sampled by so and so.
  • faux_rillzfaux_rillz 14,343 Posts
    I've seen this a couple times and passed it up, once cause it was too pricey (they had it for $40 or so) and the other time just cause I was high as fuck.

    The respect label has been a curiousity to me, all I know on it are a handful of John Kasandra releases and this Ingram LP. did they release any other full lengths?

    Couple of Jesse Jackson LPs
  • pickwick33pickwick33 8,946 Posts
    I've seen this a couple times and passed it up, once cause it was too pricey (they had it for $40 or so) and the other time just cause I was high as fuck.

    The respect label has been a curiousity to me, all I know on it are a handful of John Kasandra releases and this Ingram LP. did they release any other full lengths?

    Couple of Jesse Jackson LPs

    and thats it.

    respect had something like seven albums in all
  • GuzzoGuzzo 8,611 Posts
    I've seen this a couple times and passed it up, once cause it was too pricey (they had it for $40 or so) and the other time just cause I was high as fuck.

    The respect label has been a curiousity to me, all I know on it are a handful of John Kasandra releases and this Ingram LP. did they release any other full lengths?

    Couple of Jesse Jackson LPs

    do the Jesse Jackson albums offer any music?
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