| It's Hammond-rific! |
Yes, that’s a thing.
I didn’t know myself until this morning.
Technically, the proper term for it is ‘Hammond Beat,’ and it refers to groove and rock based instrumentals where the central instrument is a Hammond organ. The brainchild of Paolo Negri, the Link Quartet was formed in 1993 and has been putting out these slightly spacey, slightly surfy tunes ever since--save for a three year break in the oughts.
I’ve been getting into a lot of surf music lately, spurred on by my love of Los Straitjackets to explore both the pioneers of the form and more contemporary practitioners. Because of the uniquely artficial sound of the Hammond, the Link Quartet seem similar but apart; it’s almost as if Negri and his bandmates have found the crossroads where surf rock and the exotica lounge crowd meet, creating a fusion that gives us something akin to a jam band for hipsters--more controlled, less meandering, but with that spirit of improvisation still very much alive.
I don’t know where I got this track from--my guess is it’s another one of those mp3s I lucked into through my weekly download of the Revolution Rock radio show--but what I’ve heard has intrigued me enough to investigate this heretofore unknown-to-me subgenre of music a little more.
Here's the song, so you can decide for yourself if it's for you....
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