{"id":2588,"date":"2021-08-17T06:37:00","date_gmt":"2021-08-17T06:37:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.sebpalmer.com\/blog\/?p=2588"},"modified":"2025-01-22T13:59:14","modified_gmt":"2025-01-22T13:59:14","slug":"music-wild-peaceful-kool-the-gang","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.sebpalmer.com\/blog\/?p=2588","title":{"rendered":"Music: Wild &amp; Peaceful, Kool &amp; The Gang"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1000\" height=\"1000\" src=\"http:\/\/www.sebpalmer.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/img_3200-1.jpg\" class=\"wp-image-26191\" srcset=\"http:\/\/www.sebpalmer.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/img_3200-1.jpg 1000w, http:\/\/www.sebpalmer.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/img_3200-1-300x300.jpg 300w, http:\/\/www.sebpalmer.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/img_3200-1-150x150.jpg 150w, http:\/\/www.sebpalmer.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/img_3200-1-768x768.jpg 768w, http:\/\/www.sebpalmer.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/img_3200-1-100x100.jpg 100w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 767px) 89vw, (max-width: 1000px) 54vw, (max-width: 1071px) 543px, 580px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"184\" height=\"30\" src=\"http:\/\/www.sebpalmer.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/stars_11_six-1-1.jpg\" class=\"wp-image-26192\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Tantric Funk (18 Jul 2009)*<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>*This is a slightly edited version of my very old Amazon review.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I wrote a piece on this album for <em>Drummer<\/em> magazine (go buy it, it&#8217;s a great read!) some time back, and just now, listening to &#8216;Heaven At Once&#8217; (track four) I thought \u2018I bet if anyone&#8217;s reviewed this for Amazon this they haven&#8217;t mentioned this little doozy\u2019. &#8230; I took a quick look, and it appears [at least at that time, pre 2018?] my suspicions were correct.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Andy Edwards [who had a review on Amazon UK when I wrote this] has already said enough to justify any funk (or jazzy soul) lover flopping out their wallets or prizing open their purses for the better known tracks. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1000\" height=\"849\" src=\"http:\/\/www.sebpalmer.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/img_3201-1.jpg\" class=\"wp-image-26193\" srcset=\"http:\/\/www.sebpalmer.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/img_3201-1.jpg 1000w, http:\/\/www.sebpalmer.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/img_3201-1-300x255.jpg 300w, http:\/\/www.sebpalmer.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/img_3201-1-768x652.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 767px) 89vw, (max-width: 1000px) 54vw, (max-width: 1071px) 543px, 580px\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Kool, and the totally groovy Gang.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>I just want to add that &#8216;Heaven At Once&#8217; is a thing of nonpareil beauty, and yet another compelling reason to shell out for this masterpiece. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Kicking off with a languid and harmonious 16th note groove, a fabulous horn arrangement, with sax and vibes tootling away, a child&#8217;s voice then enters into a truly wonderful dialogue with superdude Kool, who ultimately reveals that he and his band, under the cover of being a completely groovy funky soulful outfit (not that he makes that boast), are actually &#8220;scientists of sound, mathematically putting it down&#8221;&#8230; <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And what are these funky boffins (re)searching for? &#8220;The key to the light&#8221;. &#8220;What&#8217;s the key to the light?&#8221; You might well ask, as does the kid rappin&#8217; with Kool&#8230; for the answer, go buy this deliciously fabulous peach of an album.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It saddens me to say this, but, as far as I know, they (and by they I don&#8217;t mean Kool &amp; The Gang, I mean anyone) don&#8217;t generally make &#8217;em like this any more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>UPDATE<\/strong> (Jan, \u201825)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>After crying like a big baby for hours, listening to their 80s hit Cherish, and the whole of Wild &amp; Peaceful, for the umpteenth time, I felt perhaps I should address the rest of this awesome &#8211; six stars, no less! &#8211; recording.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Tantric Funk (18 Jul 2009)* *This is a slightly edited version of my very old Amazon review. I wrote a piece on this album for Drummer magazine (go buy it, it&#8217;s a great read!) some time back, and just now, listening to &#8216;Heaven At Once&#8217; (track four) I thought \u2018I bet if anyone&#8217;s reviewed this &hellip; <\/p>\n<p class=\"link-more\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.sebpalmer.com\/blog\/?p=2588\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Music: Wild &amp; Peaceful, Kool &amp; The Gang&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paGwUa-FK","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.sebpalmer.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2588"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.sebpalmer.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.sebpalmer.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.sebpalmer.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.sebpalmer.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2588"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.sebpalmer.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2588\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":26194,"href":"http:\/\/www.sebpalmer.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2588\/revisions\/26194"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.sebpalmer.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2588"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.sebpalmer.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2588"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.sebpalmer.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2588"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}