Adebisi Shank - This Is The Second Album Of A Band Called Adebisi Shank

There have been so many great albums to come out of Ireland this year that I’m going to have to go into greater detail about all those fantastic happenings (of the musical variety of course, because I don’t know if you’ve heard, but we’re kind of screwed over here) in a separate post. I can say for sure that not one Irish record released in 2010 could come close to being as thrillingly inventive as the second album by (a band called) Adebisi Shank.

The first of four to feature in our, er, feature, ‘This Is The Second Album…’ stands out because it’s like absolutely nothing I’ve heard in quite a while. Tipping its hat to Oriental music and 80s video game soundtracks (‘International Dreambeat’), heavy metal (the galloping bass on ‘Genki Shank’ couldn’t be anything else) and one hell of a lot of other things in between (Afrobeat and prog-rock among them), it mixes up its influences and churns out something that’s 100% Adebisi.

On a record label that has become well known for guitar-heavy post-rock (Richter Collective - and I have more to say about that lot), these Dubliners stand out because they don’t want to sound like anyone in particular. I’d be hard put to tell you anyone else who does what these guys do. They don’t keep still, and it’s their sheer bloody-minded determination to stick out from the crowd that’s resulted in a baffling, brain-bendingly brilliant comeback. [GO’M]