After the last month of waiting for their debut album to drop (we had earlier shared several tracks from their new collection), British underground musical innovators REE-VO finally have it – titled ‘All Welcome on Planet Ree-Vo’, the album is out today. Here we have 10 tracks that punch with a mix of red-eyed paranoia and playful future funk with additional sprinklings of trip hop, breakbeat, jungle, dancehall and dub. Quite the smorgasbord of genres here, all so fabulously pulled off.
Ree-Vo is Andy Spaceland (AKA Andy Jenks) and T. Relly. Recorded, produced and mixed by Andy at Bristol’s Christchurch Studios, known as the home of ‘Mezzanine’-era Massive Attack, this album was tweaked and fine-tuned during the summer of 2020.
The focus track on this occasion is the lively upbeat dance number ‘Spacebox’, perhaps the catchiest song on the record – one to get your blood flowing and trigger your desire to rave out. Just a drop in the bucket of what is, overall, a superb cutting-edge album. Maybe it will be too much for some folks, with so many stuck in the mid-range doldrums of spoon-fed algorithm-based online music, but one thing is for sure – REE-VO has launched an awesome trajectory for itself and is in fantastic flight. This is one act that will be hard to follow.
“Lift off, blast off, shirt off, dance off! Naked in the dancehall SPACE BOX!” is the beamed mantra, Relly transmitting to all occupants of the galaxy. We wanted to make a hedonistic and colourful dancehall track, a bold response to the suppressive circumstances of the last two years,” says Andy Spaceland
This project really could only have formed in one city, steeped as it is in Bristol’s decades of less conventional hip hop and bass music. Heavily shaped by the local scene and artists synonymous with hip-hop and reggae’s cultural social commentary, such as the Bug and Flowdan, Nas, Kojey Radical, Rob Smith, Massive Attack, Big Cat Burns and Mantronix.
After art school (where Brian Eno was his examiner), Andy Spaceland got involved in bass music with Bristol’s Static Sound System and a collaborative 12” with Rudy Tambala (AR Kane) as Sugarboat Vs Sufi, before his band Alpha signed to Massive Attack’s Melankolic label and he became their tour DJ. He has collaborated with Smith and Mighty, Horace Andy,Elizabeth Fraser and Madonna, and has released music on Dj Die’s label Gutterfunk as White Bully. Andy is also part of 5 Billion in Diamonds with LA producer Butch Vig (Nirvana, Garbage) and is working on new material with Mark Stewart (The Pop Group), as well as Adrian Sherwood.
T. Relly is Bristol hip-hop royalty – known in the community variously for his links to all of the city’s major club nights, his passion and support for the most disadvantaged (through his work with the youth and prison leavers), through to compering stages at St Paul’s Carnival and his seminal 2018 album with DJ Rogue ‘Let Them Know’. He collaborates with many crews including Innalife and Killer Crab Men.
“Our sound has the life blood of sound-system bass culture carried through veins of hiphop and rave. I describe it like that BCuz it’s a live and living thing not just a sound, though essentially it is Bristol Dirt. Both me and Andy, as individuals, have very different sounds but as a duo, the sound for me is totally of one, which is Rare throughout collaborations. The sound just fits. It’s edgy, consciously upbeat and fun yet seriousness throughout – such as life,” says T. Relly.
“This release has been a long time coming. Me and Andy met through a mutual friend and instantly became friends, when that shit happens the universe has already decided on something great happening. With that we never gave up on Ree-Vo throughout multiple frustrations, let downs and genre life getting in the way.”
‘All Welcome on Planet Ree-Vo’ is available on turquoise-blue gatefold vinyl, CD and digitally via Dell’Orso Records and Southern Record Distributors (SRD). Upon purchasing the album, folks will also receive the orange vinyl 10″ (in limited quantity) featuring four remixes and collaborations involving The Bug, Object Object, NØISE and Dälek. It can be ordered at https://lnk.to/Ree-VoEDDA52.
CREDITS
Recorded, produced and mixed by Andy Spaceland at Christchurch Studios, Bristol
Written by T. Relly and Andy Spaceland (AKA Andy Jenks)
Lyrics by and vocals by T. Relly
Music by Andy Spaceland
Cover artwork by Bobby Klang
Released by Dell’Orso Records – EDDA52LP/CD
Distributed by SRD
10″ EP TRACKLIST
A) Ree-Vo ‘Protein’ (The Bug remix)
Ree-Vo ‘We Go’ (Object Object remix)
AA) NØiSE ‘Automatic’ (Ree-Vo remix)
Ree-Vo ‘Groove With It’ (Deadverse remix) by Dälek
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