“GOD IS A MAKE BELIEVE FRIEND FOR GROWN UPS” by the The Big Mackoofy, requires at least twelve different reviewers, or at the very worse, twelve different listening sessions on different days by one reviewer. Two things are not to be discussed when listening to this album – genres and cohesiveness – unless you want to descend into a never-ending spiral of impossible explanation. The Big Mackoofy don’t play any one genre, they are unto themselves a genre. One song does not cohesively follow another like a dot by dot painting, The Big Mackoofy represent an expansion of sound and color. “GOD IS A MAKE BELIEVE FRIEND FOR GROWN UPS” is the musical equivalent of the universe’s big bang theory.
The Big Bang theory is an effort to explain what happened at the very beginning of our universe. Discoveries in astronomy and physics have shown beyond a reasonable doubt that our universe did in fact have a beginning. Prior to that moment there was nothing; during and after that moment there was something: our universe.
The big bang theory is an effort to explain what happened during and after that moment. In the case of The Big Mackoofy, prior to the release of “GOD IS A MAKE BELIEVE FRIEND FOR GROWN UPS” there was nothing like this type of music made by one single band; during and after that moment there is something: universal music!
Quite simply The Big Mackoofy, take the entire band’s influencing styles, genres and sub-genres, and fling them through a 3-man blending machine that go by the names of Jeff Lucas, Anthony Joseph and Eddie Blindell. The result is 12 tracks of several hundred billion sounds that go from Soul to Reggae, Ska, Hiphop and Rock to Funk and anything else they can muster – in an album soaring through the musical cosmos, inside of an expanding musical universe that began as an infinitesimal singularity and which appeared out of somewhere in London for reasons still unknown.
Any discussion of the Big Bang theory and this album title, would be incomplete without asking the question, what about God? This is an area where science and theology meet. Creation was a supernatural event. That is, it took place outside of the natural realm.
This fact begs the question: is there anything else which exists outside of the natural realm? Specifically, is there a master Architect out there? We won’t attempt to answer that question, but what if…“GOD IS A MAKE BELIEVE FRIEND FOR GROWN UPS”?
I’m not sure who does what on this album, but you’ll hear singing, rapping and a whole lot of grooving going on. Because if there is one constant or ‘cohesive’ factor running through this album, its groove! From the smooth melodic groove of “Walk Away (feat. Ferisha)”, or the bass heavy groove of “Bring Back The Lovers”. Maybe even the soul-infested funk groove of “Super Wanger”, or the reggae groove of “YES I S”, the rap groove of “Indian Dub”, and probably the grooviest track of all, “Lady of The Night”.
I could go on and on, but the groove is endless on this album, as is the musical creativity shown on each track. The fact is, The Big Mackoofy is one of the most forward-looking bands of the modern era and arguably, the first genuinely, all-out cosmic music band…with or without God!
OFFICIAL LINKS: WEBSITE
