{"product_id":"wilbur-niles-thrust-vinyl","title":"Thrust (Vinyl)","description":"\u003cp\u003eA track about an African king recorded in the back of a car wash commands $1,600. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAt the makeshift Man-Ray Studios in Akron, Ohio, where barrels of soap were rolled away to make room for recording, guitarist Wilbur Niles and his then-girlfriend — keyboardist Machelle McNeal — recorded “Ja Ja.” It was titled after King Jaja of Opobo in Nigeria, who lived during the 19th century, rising from slavery to become a wildly successful broker of palm oil.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eNiles learned about Jaja as an undergrad majoring in history; humid and dreamy, it would lead off the pair’s first and only album together, 1979’s rawly-produced Thrust. It begins with an elliptical little electric-piano hook by McNeal, an accomplished musician without much jazz experience, accompanied by wind sounds. The effect is of sparkles of sunlight through an otherwise dense sheet of fog.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThrust exists in that blurry, liminal space between jazz, funk, soul, and R\u0026amp;B; ‘70s-era CTI comes to mind, but the unpolished vibe sloughs off that comparison, too. Even when “Summer Fun” goes for a four-on-the-floor feeling, the mid-fidelity production renders it diaphanous. The more strident “Punk Funk” is a nod to Devo, whose road crew ran Man-Ray. (“They’re punk; I’m the funk!” Niles explained with a laugh, on the Sounds Visual Radio podcast.)\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eYou’ll swear you’ve heard Thrust sampled somewhere in the hip-hop sphere; pull up “Ja Ja” on YouTube, and you’ll see a comment to that end: “Pete Rock sent me here.” (Google comes up short on that one, but WhoSampled cites the following track, “Summer Fun,” as appearing in Canadian house\/electronica producer Daphni’s “Hey Drum” and British techno\/house DJ and producer Trus’me’s “At the Disco.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eA1. Ja Ja - 6:31\r A2. Summer Fun - 4:02\r A3. Punk Funk - 5:34\r A4. Hypertension - 3:30\r B1. Untitled - 5:20\r B2. Quiet Isle - 6:21\r B3. One Slave, One Gun - 5:02\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cul\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eFormat Detail: LP\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eFormat: Vinyl\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eGenre: R\u0026amp;B\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003c\/ul\u003e","brand":"Wilbur Niles","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":42010585759825,"sku":"Q4KE2K-DDVD-8H","price":30.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0620\/5023\/8545\/files\/wilbur-niles-thrust_cIZrZ.jpg?v=1759471926","url":"https:\/\/apocalypsevinyl.com\/products\/wilbur-niles-thrust-vinyl","provider":"Apocalypse Vinyl","version":"1.0","type":"link"}