‘As We Return’ is the new album from French soul and funk band A-P CONNECTION – essentially Antoine Perez and Pierre Bonnet (hence the name!) Their mutual passion is funk and disco music of the 70’s and 80’s and that’s been evident in all their releases – check out their last album 2024’s ‘Sky Odyssey’.
For ‘As We Return’, the Connection have teamed up with another artist with similar tastes – REVOLUCIEN. We’re told that his passion and inspiration is the music of people like Parliament-Funkadelic, Prince, and Earth, Wind & Fire. It’s easy to understand why he’s already worked with A-P Connection!
Thus is you like the sounds of the heroes we’ve listed above, you’ll find plenty of delights on the 10 tracker that is ‘As We Return’. Across the set, you’ll hear plenty of spaced out electro funk, soaring harmonies, soulful lead vocals, crashing beats, vocoder, Linn drums and plenty of special FX.
From a soul point of view the highlight is without doubt ‘I’m What You Want’. This begins in acapella fashion before settling into a lovely Weekender groove, while the horn break is a real delight. The soulful vocal’s down to Heather Haywood.
Amongst the other vocalists on the album are Ryan Konline, Matthew Clanton and Princess Freesia. Clanton takes lead vocal on another of the set’s standouts – the sweet and gentle ‘Our Universe’ which builds real momentum as it drives along.
Amongst the musicians are top session sax man Graeme Blevins while the guitar parts are down to a certain Marlon L McClain who soul and funk collectors know was a main man in Pleasure, so you sort of see where the music’s coming from. The art work (above) is another clue – yes, there’s a kind of space, sci-fi theme going – very Parliament/Funkadelic’s at times. If you’re a more conservative soul collector that might put you off – but can I suggest that you give the track ‘I’m What You Want’ a test drive – you’ll probably like it!
