Coming on the heels of Jackpot Records' vinyl reissue of The Wild Magnolias' S/T debut LP, we proudly announce the band’s follow-up record, They Call Us Wild. Championed by critic Robert Christgau as creating “the most boisterous recorded party I know,” the band released this funk masterpiece in 1975, but now with a psychedelic streak running deeply throughout it.
While the first album (which was also the first commercially released record by a Mardi Gras Indian group) declared "Smoke Your Peace Pipe (Smoke It Right)", They Call Us Wild is a different type of "elevated" sonic celebration.
Vocals echo and drip; saxophones and keyboards swing from each other’s arms, and the omnipresent multi-layered percussion, which The Wild Magnolias were known for, showcase why they continue to be one of the most sampled bands of all time (they have been sampled by everyone from Nas to Public Enemy to Jungle Brothers).
With producer Philippe Rault at the helm once again, he continued to capture the dense magic within the band, but on They Call Us Wild, they are taking a darker, more haunted approach with their music. The smokey interplay on songs like “Injuns, Here We Come”, with its jazzy piano/bass meltdown (courtesy of Erving Charles Jr. & Wilson Turbinton of the legendary New Orleans funk band The Gaturs), solidified them as a band rather than capturing a moment...even though the celebration in the studio is still going just as strong. The band also takes itself to new sonic territory, for instance, slowing things down with “Jumalaka Boom Boom,” with its sexy groove and spoken-word storytelling sections that rival the best of P-Funk.
