Artist: Pucho & His Latin Soul Brothers

Title: Super Freak

Format: Vinyl LP

Genre: Jazz

UPC: 780661500612

Release Date: 2022

Record Label: Cubop Records

Album Tracks

1. Medley: Superfly / Pusherman / Freddie's Dead
2. Judy's Moods
3. Oak Hurst Art
4. S'cusa S'cusa (Why)
5. Don't Mind the Tears
6. One More Day

The opening track on 1972's Super Freak is a brilliant, nearly side-long medley of three tracks from Curtis Mayfield's Superfly: the title track, "Pusherman," and, of course, "Freddie's Dead." Heavy, druggy, and psychedelic, with thick organ and wah-wah guitars, the medley sounds more like the psychedelic soul of War or even Funkadelic than the sparkling Latin jazz of Pucho's earlier albums. The rest of Super Freak is a little lighter in tone, but this is still the most groove-oriented and least overtly Latin jazz-oriented of this group's albums, trafficking instead in shuffling grooves like "Oak Hurst's Art" and vibes-led ballads like "Judy's Moods" and "One More Day." Latin jazz purists may balk, but this later became a classic of the '90s acid jazz movement, which some sources date to the U.K. hip-hop group Galliano pinching a sample from this album's version of "Freddie's Dead" for the 1989 single "Frederick Lies Still." -AllMusic