11 October 2011

Review: Dennis Coffey 'Dennis Coffey'













DENNIS COFFEY
Dennis Coffey
[Strut]

Don't call this a comeback, he's been here for years. Detroit guitar legend Dennis Coffey's raw and funky playing can be heard on a roll call of seminal songs - The Temptations' Ball Of Confusion and Cloud Nine, The Sylvers' Boogie Fever, Edwin Starr's War, Freda Payne's Band Of Gold, among many, many others - as Coffey was a member of the original Motown Funk Brothers' backing band, popularising a heavy, funky guitar sound. But this self-titled set for Strut is no old timers' get-together: guests include Mayer Hawthorne, Mick Collins (The Dirtbombs) and Fanny Franklin (Orgone), and Coffey stylishly leads a crack band through a dense selection of new material and hand-picked covers (from The Parliaments and Funkadelic to 100 Proof Aged In Soul and more). The funk and fuzz levels are set to high, with a swirling, soulful psychedelica permeating most tracks. A rare treat from one of the originators.

3 and 1/2 stars from 5

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