Cool Hunting

By happy accident I recently caught the amazing sounds of The Heavy on a BBC radio live session and almost had to stop the car for fear of crashing with the thrill of it. Incredibly rich, funky and, well, appropriately heavy music; the lead singer's voice could melt your insides.

Although musical comparisons are often crass, you can't help but hear echoes of Curtis Mayfield, Parliament, Jimi Hendrix and Amy Winehouse sounding a bit retro and contemporary at the same time. The band describes their sound much more eloquently, "Picture Tom Waits fostering the RZA while John Bonham and The Parliaments host a garage sale for Chester Burnett, Willie Mitchell and the Stooges...The Heavy reek of lo fi samples, broken down beats, a disgusting but yet compelling delivery on all fronts and more stinky than anything that has ever come out of your back passage."

The Heavy hail from Noid, a small town in South West England and their debut album, "Great Vengeance and Furious Fire," was released on Counter Records/NinjaTune in the U.K. in October of 2007. It's set for release in the U.S. early this year. Pick up copy at Amazon.