Shriekback's final studio album,
Sacred City went out of print almost immediately after its 1992 release; this reissue, with the advantages of 20/20 hindsight, proves the group to have been well ahead of their time, their music predating the subsequent rise of electronica via its use of dub and drum'n'bass-styled sampled rhythms. Recorded with original members Barry Andrews,
Dave Allen and Martyn Barker as well as
Karl Hyde, later to resurface in
Underworld,
Sacred City lacks the ingenious spark of such peak
Shriekback efforts as Oil and Gold and
Big Night Music, but their intellectual art-funk always makes for intriguing listening -- an album (and band) overdue for rediscovery. ~ Jason Ankeny