No Categories 5
Electronic Music for Eclectic Minds
Ubiquity
Ubiquity has been putting it down now for 12 strong years, and listening to the latest No Categories will tell you why they won’t be stopping any time soon. This label has been producing some of the best danceable electronic music since its inception; its Luv N Haight imprint has been unearthing the greatest funk gems; and CuBop has put the clave back into America’s dance floor rhythms. Therefore, one can never mind when Ubiquity comes out with their annual, self-congratulatory backslap.
This year’s compilation provides a little twist, though: all the tracks have either been previously unreleased on CD or remixed especially for this disc. Though it means excising the funk, No Categories 5 is still an impressive disc that clears the mighty high bar Ubiquity has set for itself.
P’Taah opens the disc with a spacey-jazzed, Brazil-scented, “Hold You Close.” Interfearance contributes a heart-exploding percussion extravaganza with “Xtradition.” Dark Leaf offers up more of their envelope-pushing hip-hop with “Contact,” which screams the question: “When the hell are they coming out with their own album?!” Jack Costanzo teams up with Big Mountain’s Quino for a “Mr. Bongo”-ed-out “Calypso Blues.” And the disc comes to a smoldering conclusion with Johnny Frigo’s “Gazebo.” This is yet another treat brought to you by Ubiquity that has you looking forward to No Categories 6, 7, 22, and n.
Ubiquity Records: http://www.ubiquityrecords.com