Randa & The Soul Kingdom - A Review

It’s obvious from the start that Randa & The Soul Kingdom have been brought up on a healthy diet of late 60’s and early 70’s funky jam with lashings of JB sauce. The strange thing that surprised me though was that as I listened to it I was also reminded of the vibes given off by those early 90’s Acid Jazz scene heavyweights The Brand New Heavies and their excellent self titled debut. This for sure is the road that they should have travelled rather than to release of the over polished and commercialised ‘Brother Sister’, expanding on the vocal side, picking up the pace but keeping that gritty fat funk vibe.
Jordanian born but raised in Australia singer Randa Khamis, she has also sung with Speedometer, even sounds a bit like N'Dea Davenport who supplied the vocals as the Heavies strutted out way back when. Producer Lance 'Bamboos' Ferguson has done a great job. Nice tight, stunted guitar licks, big bursts of brass and keeps the BPM up with plenty of loose free flowing fire cracker drums. Sure they haven’t ripped up the funk soul book and brought anything new to the table, but are rather paying homage to days when hot and sweaty funk was the new cool and I for one from time to time like to get a bit sweaty…..

-