Uncle Junior's Friday Fish Fry

DJ Djinji Brown's second album, Uncle Junior's Friday Fish Fry, takes the listener on a fascinating journey around the world and through time to stitch together some truly funky beats into a mix that will get you on the floor and keep you there. It is also interesting enough for headphone listening too. The seamless flow takes in diverse sources like blaxploitation soundtracks, Afro-funk, smooth house, dub, funk, hip-hop, Latin jazz, and Cuban sounds. All the tracks are first-class dance music, but the highlights of the set are Afronaught's '70s jazz meets progressive house jam "Transcend Me," Gregory Isaacs' deep and dread dub track "Crofs (Slum Dub)," Peven Everett's slick and funky neo-soul track "Testin' Me," Manu Dibango's "African Battle," which sounds like the funkiest game show theme ever, and Brown's own "Blue Hunny," a flowing house track that manages to jam most of his influences into one song. Brown's mixing skills are solid but unspectacular; his strength lies in the selection of the tracks and in the juxtaposition of sounds, cultures, and rhythms.