Wonderful words by the ever erudite Adam Turner.

Tribal Italia was a label set up in 1995, in Riccione on Italy’s eastern riviera. It’s a label associated heavily with Cosmic and Afro sounds. Trip Advisor says that Riccione is ‘sun soaked and stylish’ and is ‘the perfect place to sip a cocktail while lounging on golden sands’, while at night ‘party people spill from the open-air discos onto the beach.’ I haven’t been but it sounds idyllic. This location surely needs a soundtrack and fortunately Dualismo Sound have compiled one, a best of Tribal Italia, a six track sampler that’s a spot-on score for this apparent Adriatic paradise.

Tribal Italia were partly inspired by hip hop sample culture, partly by the Italo sounds around them, and partly by the London “world” club sounds of acts such as Loop Guru and Transglobal Underground. The tracks assembled here are a great example of what Andrew Weatherall used to call ‘a wonky approximation’. The artists involved have heard records and sounds that they like and in attempting to make their own versions have gone off in various directions, creating something very much of their own.

The album is an alternative and otherworldly journey, one that kicks off with the hip hop drums of Meo & Steve’s Global Village (Funk Version). Riding this rhythm are a circular organ riff and a wailing female vocal. A heady combination already, this is then joined by some sax. It’s proper summer holiday music – the good people at Trip Advisor would surely  approve.

Kalua & DJ Brahms track Brain is also built around sampled B-boy breaks, something that’s sonically some way from the classic Italo disco sound. A wiggling distorted synth bass-line writhes around, reminiscent of post-punk-funkers 23 Skidoo, while pan pipes flit in and out.

DJ Vale’s Bengali Song starts out with Indian hand percussion, before being joined by  rumbling bass and a crunching kick. A male Indian vocal adds to the continent hopping, the ‘world sound’ Tribal Italia were known for in full effect. The second half, after the breakdown, is quite the experience, with all kinds of shakers, timbales, and stuff summoning up a storm as the chanting and woodwind and pipes weave about.

Flip the record over and Meo & Steve return with Aries, boasting more funked up hip hop drums, an 808, and colourful synth squiggles, plus a vocal celebrating Shiva. The piano breakdown and squiggle re-entry is pure mid-90s Italo in feel but it heads in all sorts of other directions at the same time – call it tribal, global, cosmic house.

A remix of DJ Fary’s Punani Fantasy follows. There seems to be some confusion over this tune’s title. Discogs claims it should be Punjabi Fantasy and in the comments Fary  confirms this. Whatever its name, the track is a marvellous mix of Andean panpipes, ragga vocals, and a monstrous breakbeat. It’s the very essence of Tribal Italia’s musical mission.

The collection closes with Mamukata and Liquid Feet, a track that builds slowly with sitars, samples, and hand drums, until another one of those breakbeats jumps in and gives it some serious propulsion. It’s the sound of two, or three, different cultures welded together as one.

Tribal Italia Breaks is out now on Dualismo Sound. 

You can find more proper, on point, prose from Adam Turner over at his own brilliant blog, The Bagging Area. Adam is also part of the admin team at the mighty Flightpath Estate.