The Incredible Bongo Band: Bongo Rock - 1973

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This was a remarkable little curio "deep cut" of an album, the brainchild of one Michael Viner, and one that actually made the top 100 albums list for 1973.

It is an instrumental album based around (unsurprisingly) bongos and lots of bass, as well as some killer percussion. For 1973, it is really quite adventurous, influencing, it is said, many hip/hop artists. That isn't something I know much about, but what I do know is that it is funky has hell, full of bassy rhythms, Booker T. organ, bold Blaxploitation-style strings and bass and Papa Was A Rolling Stone-esque cymbals. You can hear its influence in the music of Cymande as well. 

The group, as well as performing their own material, covered established classics like The Shadows' Apache and, would you believe, The Stones' (I Can't Get No) Satisfaction (on the follow-up album). When they do so they remind me a bit of the way Ananda Shankar took on Jumpin' Jack Flash on his eponymous 1979 sitar-based album. Stick this on as upbeat background music. It has a great sound quality too.

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