1. Make Me Happy
2. What a Surprise 2000
3. We Don’t Have to be Alone (Basement Jaxx)
4. Smile
5. Coolys Wages
6. Over & Over
7. Could You Love Me
8. Deeper
9. We Don’t Have to be Alone (Guiro)
Coolys Hot Box is a jazz funk band from New York. The band is made up of four key members; the uber talented Christian “Cooly” Urich who plays drums, keys & vocals. Victor Axelrod on keys. Ernesto Abreau on percussion and the sweet lead vocals of Angela Johnson. Christian and Angela have worked on many projects with various producers including DJ Disciple, DJ Dove, Armand Van Helden and also co-wrote and sung on Roger Sanchez’s top 10 hit “ I Never Knew.”
The next hottest act in music has been marinating for the last nine years. In that time, New York City-bred Cooly's Hot-Box has been cooking up a
Percolating gumbo of uplifting, sophisticated soul, accented with flavourful dashes of funk, jazz, and dance. Now simmered to perfection, the band is ready to let the world in on its tasty musical recipe with the domestic release of its first album via Higher Octave/Virgin Records, "Take It."
Comprised of drummer/vocalist John Christian Urich, lead vocalist Angela Johnson, percussionist Ernesto Abreu, and keyboardist Victor Axelrod, Cooly's Hot-Box is an eclectic soul group whose talent as a "real" live band takes you back to the spirited creativity of such predecessors as Earth, Wind & Fire, the Average White Band, Mint Condition, Family Stand, and the Brand New Heavies. Melding backgrounds in jazz, funk, R&B, classical, Afro-Cuban, and reggae, the foursome met while pursuing undergraduate degrees in studio composition at New York's Suny Purchase College.
Playing together since 1990, Cooly's Hot-Box began making a name for itself in 1993 with the release of "Don't Throw My Love Around," which appears on the London Records compilation "Giant Steps." That cut caught the attention of Armand Vanhelden, who sampled the track's memorable keyboard riff for his hit, "The Funk Phenomena." Four years later, the quartet released another single via Sole Records in the U.K. and Groovin' Records domestically, "We Don't Have to Be Alone."
That was followed a year later in 1998 with two more Sole releases, "Could You Love Me" and "Make Me Happy." Then in TK, the group was signed by Purpose Records, headed by principals Russell Johnson and George Littlejohn. Its debut album, "Take It," is already making considerable waves in the U.K. with its release through Dome Records. Its domestic release through Higher Octave/Virgin is slated for January 2002.
Cooly's Hot-Box has since become a fixture on the tour circuit, steadily building its cadre of fans through sweeps across the U.S., Canada, and the U.K. In the process the group has attracted the admiration of its musical peers, opening for such notables as B.B. King, the Neville Brothers, A Tribe Called Quest, Roger Troutman and Zapp, Speech (Arrested Development), the Last Poets, Zhané, the Pharcyde, and Guru's "Jazzmatazz” project.
Given the growing popularity of neo-soul, the time is right for real practitioners of R&B/soul, not cookie-cutter clones, to take centre stage again. It's time for Cooly's Hot-Box.
This album contains productions and remixes from some of the worlds most sought after and respected dance producers. The massive Basement Jaxx provides a remix in their unique jacking broken beat house style that has seen them project from the underground to cross over chart success. It also contains remixes and productions from DJ Spinna, KOT, Frankie Feliciano, Junior O, Rainy City, Guiro and Dino & terry.
