Released at a time when post-acid-house dance music was dominating the British music scene, Boss Drum seemed to have an uncanny handle on the cultural zeitgeist. The Shamen were not unique in forsaking indie rock for club rhythms — fellow Scots Primal Scream were among the many artists who made the same journey — but their grip seemed somehow surer, their take on cutting-edge electronica more genuine and visionary.

Boss Drum was the first album the group had recorded since former band lynchpin Will Sinnott, aka Will Sin, drowned in the Canary Islands on a 1990 video shoot. On their return, founder Colin Angus had been joined by MC/DJ/rapper Mr C and soul chanteuse Jhelisa Anderson and their beats, while still hard-edged, seemed more targeted towards the charts and commercial success.

It was to their credit that they did this without compromising the politicised, socially aware message at their core. The Shamen had always had something to say, and Boss Drum found them pushing their theories of transcendence and the Gaia Mind over techno rhythms as mesmerising and hypnotic as those generated by any blissed-out acid casualties. This might have been floor-filling club music but it was anything but mindless.

Mr C proved… read more »