New Orleans Funk Masters (Rejuvenation - Meters)

Member Name: tomflint

Product:	Rejuvenation - Meters
Date:	05/02/09 (62 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Great Performances [Bass, Drums, Organ, Guitar]

Disadvantages: If you don't like Funk music then it can be repetitive

The Meters- Rejuvenation

Year Of Release- 1974

Producers- Allen Toussaint and The Meters

1. People Say
2. Love Is For Me
3. Just Kissed My Baby
4. What' Cha Say
5. Jungle Man
6. Hey Pocky A-Way
7. It Ain't No Use
8. Loving You Is On My Mind
9. Africa

Bonus Tracks:

10. Hey Pocky A-Way [ Single Version]
11. People Say [ Single Version]

The Meters were a successful funk band in the 70s that produced a moderate collection of hits, but were mostly known for their instrumental prowess rather than commercial sales. They could count among their fans such heavyweights as Paul McCartney and Mick Jagger, who apparently used an expletive when he first saw the band live.

'Rejuvenation' is the band's 5th album and continued their successful collaboration with fellow New Orleans musical genius Allen Toussaint, who seems to have been most effective when writing songs and producing albums for others rather than his own solo career. The Meters ARE New Orleans funk. It's no surprise that Dr John used them as his backing band for his 'In The Right Place' album amongst others.

The songwriting is a collection of impressive vamps, but there are a couple of really great stand out tracks. I love the opening track 'People Say' with its distinctive syncopated rhythm and hook riff line. It's one of those pieces of music that I'm sure I've heard before but can't quite place where; I reckon probably in a Quentin Tarantino film, he used 'Cissy Strut' in 'Jackie Brown'. The other obvious stand out is 'It Ain't No Use' a 12 minute work out where each instrumentalist is given a chance to shine.

On this album there aren't the additional musicians which sometimes augmented later recordings. It's just the original four Meters giving it all they can. It seems a waste of time to say that I was blown away by the bass playing of George Porter Jr [he can both snake his way in and out of the song or more aggressively slap in perfect unison with the drums] and what about those drums?! Joseph 'Ziggy' Modeliste must be one of the greatest drummers of all time. That leaves band leader and founder member Art Neville with his silky soul vocals and electric organ sounds, and Leo Nocentelli on guitar, who is occasionally forgotten about with the amazing rhythm section, but shouldn't be as he's fantastic too.

This all points to great musicianship, but are the songs any good?. I've read reviews that say some of The Meters other albums are a bit weak on songs, but not so here. Alongside 'People Say' and 'Hey Pocky A-Way' [the 2 singles] there is also 'Just Kissed My Baby' and 'Africa' which will be familiar to fans of the Red Hot Chili Peppers as they covered it on their 'Freaky Styley' album.

The original album is 9 tracks long with 2 additional tracks on the Rhino 2001 remaster. These are unnecessary single edits of 'People Say' and 'Hey Pocky A-Way'. I really dislike this trend for padding out perfectly good albums with extra filler we don't need. The original album length is a good 45 minutes so I don't really think the consumer was being short changed. But that's a small gripe, at least there's not 5 or 6 rubbish outtakes that weren't good enough to see the light of day first time round.

I don't have any other albums by The Meters so can't really say how this stacks up with the rest of their output. This is meant to be the best album they did alongside 'Fire On The Bayou' which came next. I think this is a great party album, people should play more 70s funk at parties [?!] I'd certainly enjoy myself a lot more!. The cover art on all The Meters albums is great too. This one has a woman sat on a white couch in what looks like a scene from a blaxploitation film like 'Coffy' or 'Truck Turner'. It also has a bright pink sleeve which distinguishes it nicely from your other cd's, although in the picture here it looks purple.

I highly recommend this album which I'm sure you can get for between £4 and £6 on Amazon.

Summary: Shake yo booty