By Jake Ebdale

Released Friday June 27th, 2014 - Rosa Recordings

The consistently brilliant, unfailingly funky Sola Rosa return with a new remix album - so don't call this a comeback, just something to tide us over until the next classic.

This is a treatment they've presented for their last two studio albums (to varying degrees of success), and with any Rosa remix, the aim is to re-contextualise the groove centric Spraggonite songs into lighter, more spiralling affairs. If anything, this will get me listening to the actual album, a killer slice of Kiwi funk that borrowed as much from Voodoo-soul and thick-as-marge Kuti vamps as it did straight pop. ‘I'm Not that Guy' was ferociously stank filled from 2011's original Low and Behold, High and Beyond; the remixes hardly muscle any musk to contend. What can you really expect from a remix album though - it's generous enough that they release these damned things.

The winners here are the summery Cooking With Caustic take on ‘Lion's Den' and the Azaxx mix of ‘Real Life', as well as the opening ‘Promise' of a Tall Black Guy remix, that again, doesn't switch things up majorly. This will definitely go down well in your new Kingsland café - but make sure you peep the real stuff. In your endless hunt for feel good Kiwi soul food, Sola Rosa offer a fruitful bounty.

3.5 / 5