The casual pop listener, or reader of Q magazine, might think that the mix of 1930s blues and 1990s hip-hop was invented, refined and elaborated on by Moby - but it's really about as new as an Ocean Colour Scene riff. Back six years ago, Morcheeba were doing the same thing, just without the kudos of having their music used as a dinner party soundtrack. Their first 12inch, Trigger Hippie (1995) still remains one of the defining moments of a time when the world had seemingly gone triphop mad. But while many bandwagon jumpers couldn't afford to pay the excess fare, Morcheeba continued to move their sound along by dint of some neat psychedelia meets soul meets dub workouts.
Formed in suburban Kent by brothers Paul and Ross Godfrey, you could be forgiven, early on, for thinking that the band were the Australian Massive Attack - given that it was some blokes noodling away in the studio and using big Soul Diva vocals from singer Skye Edwards, who you might know from her singing on the ensemble Perfect Day single on the telly.
Their patented brand of "broken beats and busted blues" quickly moved into something a bit more their own, however, on their debut, Who Can You Trust - an album that so impressed ex-Talking Head, David Byrne, that he got the band in to work with him on his solo releases. It seems quaintly odd now, but at the time Morcheeba were involved in a triphop version of the Oasis/Blur rivalry with Moloko, and were being unfavourably compared to Portishead, while all they were really interested in was producing the sort of music that would live up to their musical heroes - Boooker T and The MG's.
As good as their word, the follow-up Big Calm (1998) not only topped the million-selling mark but moved the band into, as they say themselves, "a full-blooded riot of pop colour". Gone was the downbeat, underwater tone of trip-hop: in was an up-and-funky sound that owed as much to dub as it did to pop.
The change had to do with a loosening of their "muso" sensibilities. "We just stopped getting obsessed with our music," says Paul. "The striving for perfectionism was getting in the way of expressing ourselves. Instead of morbidly fixating on certain things we just decided to make the music we love."
Before recording the new album, Fragments of Freedom, Paul went through his record collection with a fresh eye: "I listened to Michael Jackson's Off The Wall and nothing else but for about a month," he says. "Not because it was `cool' or I could use it, but just because I loved it. That's the kind of music we wanted to make, the stuff we were into before Morcheeba started - disco, pop, oldskool rap, funk. This is the most unconscious thing we've ever done."
This refreshed attitude extended to the choice of guest vocalists on the album. "So many albums nowadays have guest appearances that seem so cosmetic," he says. "They always seem to serve no actual musical purpose - the guests appear either because their record company gets them on, or because the band wants to show how cool their taste in music is. For this album, we just wanted people we felt could add to the songs; people who could only make the songs better; and people we admire and wanted to work with. Bahamadia and Mr Complex are both rappers we've loved for years and to get the one and only Box Markie freestyling on In The Hands Of The Godz was a dream come true."
This is grown-up pop with a soul appeal that sounds just right for daytime radio, although, as always, you're only likely to hear it on the "specialist" shows. Give it a go on a listening post near you: Morcheeba are the anti M-People.
Fragments Of Freedom is on the Warner label.
