West India Company is one of those enigmas that seem to plague the already weird history of rock. They got their fifteen minutes of fame around 1984 after the release of a single titled "Ave Maria", an exentric pseudo religious-disco-exercise aided by the magnificent voice of Aha Boshle.After that, they dissapeared and resurfaced in 1989 inside EG label, (yeah the same label that managed the King Crimson catalogue). New Demons is the album they published for EG and for Lalala Human Steps, a dancing troupé whose headqarters were located in London at the time.
This incaranation of West India Company was esentially a trio: Stepehen Luscombe, Pandit Dinesh and Peter Culshaw. Later they added another singer (the beautiful and stunning Priya Khajuria) and a recruited a group of session musicians to record the album and also to play in Lalala Human Steps shows, which I actually never saw, but which was supposed to be a futuiristic mix of ancient ritual indian dance and eclectic contemporary choreogaphies.
We'll never know what the dance show was like, but musically this album is an absolute masterpiece. From the very beginning the track Shankara trasports us to a possible India, surrounded by its sights, sounds, smells and godesses. Then we're suddenly taken to outer space and beyond... out of this Cosmos and into another one, a universe populated by dancing Devas, and a million dazzling Vishnus and and a trillion evanescent Shivas. We stay there until the end of the album, until we complete an overwhelming journey to the future of ritual music.
A total ethno trip.
This album is highly recommended.
Keep Listening!!!
http://rapidshare.de/files/18528042/West_India_Company_-_New_Demons.part1.rar.html
http://rapidshare.de/files/18535811/West_India_Company_-_New_Demons.part2.rar.html
Great to see this again. I bought it back in 1990 when I saw the show performed in Glasgow. It was great stuff too. La La La Human Steps were an incredibly acrobatic dance troupe. The show was multi-media with film projections and members of the band walking around on stage whilst the dancers literally threw themselves around:spinning through the air and flipping every which way. The music fused asian sounds with tribal drumming, samples and rockin guitars as I remember. I saw La La La again a couple of year slater but they didn't have the same energy this show had.
ReplyDeleteanother great share, Thanks & Cheers!
ReplyDeleteAny chance you could re-upload that link? I'm DYING for "Ave Maria" by West India Company or anyone just have an .mp3 of that? mandylorweb@yahoo.com
ReplyDeleteWhy you didn't re-up this album, 'cause still nobody can listen to it?
ReplyDelete