Global Sweatbox

The absorption of global music into psychedelic dance culture was rife with extremely questionable appropriation, and often a blurring out of difference encapsulated in the ghastly term “ethno dub” for more downtempo hippie rave sounds. But there was a huge amount, too, that involved artists of colour, that respected its constituent elements yet still took a devil-may-care, experimental approach and pushed things forward. The Nation Records label out of London, co founded by Fun Da Mental’s Aki Nawaz (formerly of Southern Death Cult with Ian Astbury), was the hub of this latter approach. They would be key in the formation of the “Asian Underground” movement with artists like Talvin Singh, TJ Rehmi and Fun Da Mental themselves – but earlier in the 90s they also overlapped into many other dance scenes, particularly progressive house. This remix collection connects their artists with a stellar lineup including Andrew Weatherall, The Drum Club, Adrian Sherwood, Youth and many more, and is as good a document of the giddy fusions of the time as you could ask for.