Again!

by Steve LeggettThe original release of Again! in 1975 was a reunion of sorts for Trinidad's Slinger Francisco (known to most of the world as Mighty Sparrow) and Jamaica's Byron Lee, who had first marketed themselves together on 1967's Only a Fool. Marketed is the right word here, since the two don't really collaborate but sort of do their respective things side by side, and with their vastly differing approaches -- Sparrow is a modern calypso singer with an occasional barbed tongue while Lee & His Dragonaires specialize in soft, string-laden pop ballad fare with just enough Caribbean lilt to keep the tourists happy -- these two artists don't necessarily fit together well. Sparrow's tracks (he uses his own musicians on them), which include "Dragon Dance," "Obeah Wedding," and "No Kind of Man at All," have a kind of good-time dance energy and feature an engaging calypso lingo that makes each of them feel like they're done with a wink of the eye and a tongue half in cheek. Lee's tracks, on the other hand, which include a cover of Bread's "If" and a surprisingly lame elevator version of the disco hit "The Hustle," sound bleached out and bland, full of keyboard-programmed string arrangements that numb everything down rather than constructively augment anything. One gets the impression of being at a wedding reception where the band has been given the instruction to keep the lid on and not get anyone too excited. Even Sparrow's tracks, while far more animated and interesting than Lee's pieces, are a good deal toned down from what the singer normally delivers. In the end, this reissue (which adds no new tracks, and one might be thankful for that) is hardly worth the bother.