This is Black Grass’s third album on Brighton’s Catskills record label and, as usual, his productions skills are crisp, clean and tight, like a tiger. The man’s versatility knows no bounds and he takes his core Hip-Hop approach and applies it, on ‘Three’, to Reggae, Funk, Boogie, Latin vibes and all things in between. Whatever the variation though, the Black Grass sound essentially always has the feel-good factor at its heart and, although this is no bad thing, I have to confess to finding the boppy, twanging, Jurassic 5-esque Hip-Hop style (that is so eagerly embraced in the UK) a little tired. The real standouts on ‘Three’ all seem to appear whenever Dionne Charles turns up on vocal duties. ‘Without Your Love’ cuts a fine figure of a freestyle boogie number that would slot seamlessly into a classic Unabombers DJ set, whilst ‘How Much Can You Take’ and ‘Hold Fire’ are two prime cuts of soulful Funk that respect the authentic ingredients and shy away from any semblance of ‘fusion’.
