LITTLE AXE - Champagne and Grits, 2004

historydeletesitse
Mar 28, 2023
2 min read

Little Axe

Champagne & Grits

Real World Records, 2004

Son of a Bluesman and one time member of the legendary Sugar Hill Records rhythm section, Little Axe’s Skip McDonald reaps a bountiful harvest here by deftly blending acoustic Blues with a Reggae twist. Long-associated with an impressive stable of musicians in Adrian Sherwood’s On-U-Sound collective, McDonald combines his earthy Blues with a Rastafarian message and the result is a heavy hybrid. Throughout the album, basic Blues song structures are executed in a deep, dank, Dub Reggae style. It’s a brilliant mix of acoustic guitars and harmonicas straight outta the delta, interwoven with Dub Reggae’s laconic rhythms and subsonic bass tones. Grounding the whole electric effort in wood and steel, Skip’s acoustic guitar sings clear and unaffected amidst the mix of bouncing echoes swirling left and right. Like that brave guitar in the crosswinds, McDonald's words of wisdom ring true, railing against our money-worshiping, materialistic culture. The throbbing “Finger On The Trigger” encapsulates all the aforementioned traits with its field holler chorus and verses lamenting the “modern day babylon” we live in. The song’s boiling, bubbling hook and righteous message stick in your mind like bittersweet molasses. This record is solid from stem to stern in spite of the presence of two tracks that have no business on the album. The undeniably catchy Euro-dance pop of “Same Boat” and moaning R&B slow jam “Say My Name” are very strong cuts in fact, but both seem out of place here. The CD is bookended by clever remakes of old blues numbers originally performed by Son House and Leadbelly. Sandwiched in between is Skip McDonald’s living breathing amalgamation of delta Blues and Dub Reggae and it’s as much of a revelation today as it was when this record was released almost 20 years ago.

Grade: A-

*** A slightly different version of this review originally appeared in Cincinnati CityBeat January 2005. ~rh