The Invaders Spacing Out

The Invaders' Spacing Out helped kickstart the retro-soul/funk scenes that birthed the likes of Daptone and Big Crown Records.

It's certainly a lodestar for Now-Again Records. This reissue was done with the license and participation of the entire Invaders band, with their story told in great detail in an oversized booklet penned by Jefferson "Chairman" Mao, complete with rare photos of this rarely seen ensemble. From the proverbial stank face-inducing opening bars of reverb-drenched drums and congas that announce Spacing Out, you're thrust into something visceral and fleeting: a pocket universe in which technical excess, chemistry between players, and the uninhibited energy of youth align in a kind of glorious imperfection.

Spacing Out is one of the greatest instrumental albums of its or any period in that unmistakably raw - as in honest - way only a crew of largely self-taught young uns could catch a groove