Sean Trane
Despite its “prog artwork” cover and hope-inducing album title, New Worlds was anything but proggy despite some tracks being technically impressive funk, but on the whole the album is a big deception for demanding music fans. Mandrill, like most other US groups fell in the disco trap that engulfed many decent funk groups like Earth Wind & Fire, Kool & The Gang (listen to their early 70’s stuff to see how proggy they were) and many others, they happily obliged to follow the example of Chic’s mix of sometimes-excellent super-funk and downright disgusting binary-disco ala Donna Summer etc… The only groups resisting that trend were WAR and Clinton’s Funkadelic.
Sure, there are remains of the former Mandrill with some (few) good tracks, (there is even one with a decent flute intervention) but the album is mostly filled of soul ballads (the opening Too Late & When You Smile) filled with those luscious Philadelphia-based string arrangements, some ultra-funk but disco-ing tracks (Mean Streets, Love Attack & Stay Tonite) with typical horn section but often marred with an horrible binary disco beat (which is an oxymoron with good funk, if you ask me) and downright-awful straight disco tracks (Don’t Stop & Easy Loving You). There is even a Latin track (Third World Girl), but it only brings the listener to more regrets of what the group became.
When I speak of this binary rhythm, I am mostly thinking of the 1-2 tempos invented for the most hopeless and sorriest excuses of dancing white males to get them to boogie on a dance floor), but in Mandrill and Chic’s case, this basic rhythm is often deceptively simple, because behind that beat is often a lot more complex rhythm than it appears at first glance:audition. In any case, certainly not Mandrill’s best works, and better avoided unless you actually like the 70’s disco scene. And I’m certainly not one of them.
