El Michels Affair: Enter the 37th Chamber [FAT BEATS]

Why you'll love it

This Fat Beats LP is the stereo edition, recorded at Soul Fire Studios in Brooklyn. Its cinematic soul arrangements of Wu-Tang songs grew out of the band's live shows backing Raekwon.

This edition

• Stereo mix
• Fat Beats edition

About the album

The Wu-Tang Clan built their sound from old soul records. Leon Michels and his band simply ran the process backwards, turning RZA's beats into the kind of dusty, string-laden soul and funk that might have been sampled in the first place.

It started on stage, backing Raekwon, and with a pair of 7-inch singles of "C.R.E.A.M." and "Bring Da Ruckus" that sold over 7,000 copies. The full album followed in 2009, with Michels on saxophone, organ and piano and Jeff Silverman co-producing. "Duel Of The Iron Mics" and "Mystery Of Chessboxin'" get moody horn lines, "Glaciers Of Ice" and "Criminology" lean into Raekwon's solo classic, "Can It All Be So Simple" turns tender, and "Shimmy Shimmy Ya" swings like a Blaxploitation chase scene. Everything was cut to tape with a vintage warmth that makes it sound as if it came out decades before the songs it covers.

Michels went on to work with Freddie Gibbs, Black Thought and Clairo, and the band has stayed a favourite of DJs and hip hop heads alike. Play it to a Wu fan without saying what it is, then watch their face around the second bar of "C.R.E.A.M."

Also at Kops: more El Michels Affair on vinyl · browse 70s Soul On Up

Tracklist

Listen

On Fat Beats (cat# FB 5127-1), a reissue of the 2009 album.