Dial 'M' For Monkey (New 2LP)

Label: Ninja Tune

Clear, 20th Anniversary Reissue

Simon Green aka Bonobo presents the 20th Anniversary Edition of Dial M for Monkey, nine perfectly formed tracks on a perfectly formed album. Now housed in beautiful packaging, with a rotating viewfinder, cyrstal clear vinyl and newly designed inners, it's outer beauty matched the beauty contained within the music. From the opener, 'Noctuary', with its creepy stoned-Hammer feel, through the headnod sitar-funk of 'Flutter', on into the Rhodes-meets-Gamelan of 'D Song', the first third of the record sets out the tone for what is to follow – all beautifully melodic and perfectly assembled but with enough of a creeping undertow to stop the music becoming empty or saccharine.  'Change Down' is all double bass folk and cut-up drums, 'Wayward Bob' is a devilish waltz, while single 'Pick Up' is a straight funk ‘n’ flute throw down.  'Something For Windy' sounds like a dub of a postman on his rounds, 'Nothing Owed' is epic pastoralia, while 'Light Pattern' rounds things off with what sounds like the theme to the best TV programme never made. With all instruments played, sampled and sequenced by Green’s own fair hand, there is a consistency here, both within the tunes and across the record that crate diggers can only dream of.