This came out in 2000 — or at least that’s when I got it. Here’s what I said about it back then (with some minor editing):
When these reggae-worshipping, house music-influenced Londoners of East Indian heritage use the word community, they’re definitely talking about the global village.
Finttingly, any of the tunes on Community Music, their fifth full-length album, would make a fine national anthem. The rubbery Jamaican-dub skank and subterranean, speaker-rattling dance beats would certainly bring stadium crowds to their feet. And they’d have to salute the quintet’s culture-vulture tactic of crossing traditional Indian instrumentation and melody with hip-hop, rap and sampling to create ethno-beat grooves that transfix and transport you simultaneously. But even if you can’t exactly sing along to the lyrics of Real Great Britain or New Way, New Life — politically charged manifestos about the cultural, racial and economic realities of life in Tony Blair’s England — their messages can be just as stirring as anything Francis Scot Key dashed off. Just put it down to Community spirit.
