Amazon.co.uk Review
Following 1997's
Illusive,
Tread is Pressure Drop's second album for
Leftfield's label, Hard Hands, a relationship that goes back to the days when Dave Henley worked in a hairdressing salon with Paul Daley. London duo Henley and Justin Langlands have spent a decade forging a unique blend of black British urban music, a hybrid of street sounds assembled from soul, reggae, dub and hip-hop that reflects our melting-pot infrastructure. The pair lack the percussive prog-house muscle of their mentors, preferring a more rootsy approach recalling the sound system origins of
Massive Attack. Sometimes they sound like several different bands, but when
Tread gels--as with the electronic hip-hop of "Hip-hop Fanatic", the lush, dubby groove of "Senorita" and the mighty, brass-driven "Take My Hand"--it makes for a pretty real document of inner-city London life.
--Mike Pattenden