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Review of The Dynamites New Album: Burn It Down

thedynamitesfeatcharleswalker Review of The Dynamites New Album: Burn It Down

Try to imagine today’s music without the influence of rhythm and blues. At its start, the genre was fueled by the things that people could easily relate to and understand – relationships, sex, camaraderie, life – and frankly, the subject material hasn’t changed much. When done right, jazz can be hot, fun, and deep – and The Dynamites, featuring singer and frontman Charles Walker, know how to do it right.

The Nashville, Tennessee-based ten-piece band’s sophomore album, Burn it Down, is something that the greats – James Brown, Ray Charles, The Brecker Brothers – would surely be proud of, with their rhythm and message ringing loud and clear.

Frontman Charles Walker, also known as Charles”Wigg” Walker, holds a career in soul and R&B that spans over four decades, and involves having worked with numerous music acts on multiple record labels (Chess, Decca, and Champion, to name a few). Having opened for the greats of music history in the late fifties onward, he brings a style and flair that can only be acquired by concentrated exposure. His vocal presence on Burn it Down unites the more here-nor-there style of funk with its older, more practical cousin, soul. Secured as the voice of the band by The Dynamites’ founder Bill Elder,Walker was the final ingredient towards a sound with such elevated energy and emotion that can inspire anyone to move, groove, and mean it every step.

Burn it Down’s twelve tracks are layered thick with feeling, in message as much as melody. Lyrically, “Can’t Get Enough” states the facts of what comes with constantly keeping up with the Joneses instead of being happy with what one has. At the same time, latter tracks “Somebody Stop Me” and “Sunny Day” screams of James Brown during his Make it Funky years, a great throwback that can’t be easily replicated. And of course, there’s nothing like the all-instrumental Afro-Cuban inspired “Treadneck” at just under two minutes proving to be just enough to grease the wheels as to what remains to follow.

It doesn’t just sound good; it is good and is inspired by what’s real. Jazz, soul, and funk tends to be like that, the understanding voice of reason, if only with an intense, heartier groove; of course, this album is no exception.

Burn it Down will be released on September 15.

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