UG UG AAH

Hailing from Brighton, The Grits emerge with their own take on raw, rare and grimy instrumental funk. Their journey began in 2005 with guitarist Stuart “Countryboy” Carter and Nick “The Organiser” Harris. Bassist James and drummer Johnny were recruited soon after, marking the birth of one seriously slick funk four piece. Their self titled debut includes a superb cover of The Soul Drifters “Funky Soul Brother”, as well as “Boom Boom”, the sold out 45 released on Freestyle and its B side ‘Jan Jan’ - an instant raw funk classic championed by Radio 2’s Mark Lamarr and Radio 6 funkster Craig Charles. With their roots firmly steeped in classic funk, The Grits add their own slant with trashy guitars, crunchy drums and deep bass. Add to this super-modulated Moog, a bag of percussion and their trademark guttural vocal grunts and you have a live show that never fails to work their live audiences into a funk frenzy. On record, The Grits manage to keep the rawness alive, whilst upping the stakes sonically with modular analogue synths, piano, harmonica and even a huge metal cabinet played with a stick.

DUJII

Formed by Ronald Bell originally as The Jazziacs, by 1969 they were called Kool and the Gang. They quickly started their own record label, De-lite. Without a lead singer, they produced funk songs from the late sixties to the early seventies with minimal vocals. This phase included releases like "Kool and the Gang", "Pneumonia", "Kool it", "Dujii", "Who's gonna take the weight" and "Chocolate buttermilk".

They hit the pop chart in 1973 and initiated a run of 19 stateside Top 40 hits on their own De-Lite label starting with "Funky Stuff", a feat consolidated the following year with a couple of Top 10 hits, "Jungle Boogie" and "Hollywood Swinging". They continued to enjoy success although their popularity momentarily wavered in the latter half of the 70s as the prominence of disco strengthened.

One of their best tracks, "Dujii", below.