Hard Grind (Vinyl LP)

Two landmark Little Axe albums are finally getting their vinyl debuts. These two blues-rooted projects of Skip McDonald (a key architect of the On-U Sound catalogue and founding member of both The Sugarhill Gang and Tackhead), has been given the Adrian Sherwood treatment. With fresh mixes from Sherwood and praised as “beautiful, gently funky, and deeply, deeply sad.” (All Music) both reissues bring McDonald’s melding of blues, dub, and soul to vinyl for the first time. - Flying Out

Hard Grind; first time vinyl edition of the 2002 album by Little Axe, the blues-infused alter ego of guitarist Skip McDonald, member of The Sugarhill Gang, Tackhead, and more, and musical arranger on a large swathe of the On-U Sound back catalogue.

“A dreamy, hazy cipher of an album that settles slowly and lazily over the listener, displacing his or her sense of time and space.Snippets of singers wafting ghostly out of the ether only to re-enter the mist and wind themselves around a slow, sultry, steamy rhythm, a heavily seductive mix that slithers around McDonald's awesome and understated guitar playing. It comes from the swampy underbelly of the Delta blues bible, and Adrian Sherwood's smoky, dubbed-out effects, loops, and echo chambers are everywhere, with sounds that come from out of time yet seem to belong right where they are.” Thom Jurek, All Music

Originally issued in the USA on Fat Possum Records. Edited for vinyl by Adrian Sherwood. Re-cut by Frank Merritt at The Carvery. Contains printed inner sleeve.

Tracklist:

1. Dark As The Night, Cold As The Ground
2. Blues Story II
3. Run Here Boy
4. All Night Party
5. Midnight Dream
6. Long Way To Go
7. Walk Right Shoes
8. Down To The Valley
9. Tight Like That
10. Seek The Truth