Funk band Speedometer drops fifth album ‘Our Kind of Movement’
Speedometer, the UK’s premier funk band, started out in 1999 playing classic funk tunes by artists such as The Meters and The JB’s in small clubs across the Southeast of England.
In 2000 they released their first single, “Soul Safari” on Soul Fire, the seminal New York label. This was soon followed with a slew of fine limited pressing releases on Timmion and Kennel Klub. Their opening release for Freestyle was a 7″ featuring a blistering funk cover of Beyonce’s “Work it Out”, with Ria Currie on vocals.
Over the years, Speedometer have worked with a host of US funk legends including Joe Quarterman, Eddie Bo, Marva Whitney, Martha High, Sharon Jones, James Bell (Highlighters), Lee Fields, Billy Wooten and Robert Moore. All were blown away by Speedometer‘s authenticity and dedication to faithfully creating that original soul-funk sound.
“Our Kind of Movement” is Speedometer‘s 5th album release for Freestyle (excluding two compilations of archive releases) and sees Vanessa Jamie and Najwa Ezzaher join James Junior on vocal duties.
On this album, the band re-explore their own diverse influences combining the heritage of Latin funk in “Funky Amigo”, Afro-Beat on “Abuja Sunrise”, Indian psychedelic on “Kashmir”, northern soul on “We gave up too soon”. There is, of course, a hefty dose of new heavy weight funk and soul tunes, as you would expect.
After 20 years of making funky music, this LP brings their experiences all together on one record whilst keeping the funk groove at it’s heart. This is Speedometer in fine form’s “Kind of Movement”.
“Our Kind of Movement” out on LP / CD / Digital on April 3rd via Freestyle
