*********************************** AM/FM ***********************************   Title : Kickin' Klasix Producer : Wham Bam 17 Bit No : 2411 No of Disks : 1 No of Tracks : 2 Musicians : Unstated  Bhangra comes to the Amiga, a combination of traditional Asian instruments, mixed in with modern dance beats. As I've never heard any form of Bhangra on the Amiga before, it was with some trepadation that I inserted the disk, and waited for the selector screen to appear. Was it going to be a "Kickin Klasix" as Wham Bam were claiming, or just a Forgettable Flop ? Har Gunga (Underground Mix) : I was wondering why there were only two tracks on the disk, and now I think I know why. This "song", and I use the word loosley, consists of 7 rather large samples, each one having a whole pattern to itself. The samples themselves are actually sampled quite well, and so they should be considering the amount of disk space they each take up. 5 of the samples come from one soure, presumably the original version of "Har Gunga", while I noticed the other two samples originate from House of Pain's, "Jump Around", and A Tribe called Quest's, "Can I Kick it ?" The trouble with trying to mix these two samples with the others were that the BPM's didn't match up, so you get a very noticible difference in the speed of the beats in the transistion from one sample to another. Rating 1. East and West Cnection : Yikes ! More of the same, as another 7 large samples go through similar treatment. The only difference between this track, and "Har Gunga", is that in this instance, it sounds like all the samples came from the same recording, resulting in the track fitting together a little more neatly. I'm not familiar with the original recording that the samples came from, but judging from the samples, it does sound like a great song, I love it's piano riff. However, does sampling large chunks from it and sticking them together make a great Amiga conversion ? Not in my opinion. Rating 1½. *********************************** AM/FM ***********************************  Composistions - I'm tempted to mark this as "Not Applicable", but I suppose some sort of explanation is really called for. All the patterns in the 2 tracks start with, for example, an "A-2" note played on each channel, and that's it, apart from the command to tell the tracker to jump to the next pattern somewhere further down. In my book, that does not constitute a "Composistion". But, in "Har Gunga", at least an attempt was made to mix in a few other samples, so I'll at least acknowledge that some effort was made. Rating 1. Samples - Okay, the samples are pretty clear, but they do take up so much space, which is why there's only two tracks on this disk. Sampling the odd breakbeat for a song can save a lot of work, and effectively save you a sound channel, but this is a bit silly. As for originality; well, I'll admit I've never heard them on an Amiga before, but ripping off large sections of a song can hardly be seen as an original sample. Rating 4. Presentation - Just a couple of static screens, one for decrunching, and a picture of an indian guy bashing a drum for the selector screen. It would have been nice if Wham Bam had told you that the left and right mouse buttons are used for selecting the songs, but trial and error brought me there eventually. Rating 3. AM/FM Rating - I'd thought, and hoped that the days of disks full of a continous sample off a popular song were over, but this is effectively what we've got with "Kickin' Klasix". It doesn't take a great deal of music talent to string together a few samples and call it a song, and why would I want the sampled version of a song when I could go out and get the CD single for the price of a few more disks ? (or a lot more disks, depending on where you live) Hopefully the next incantation of Bhangra will use proper instruments, and be a little more original. Until it comes along, avoid this one like the plague. Rating 2. *********************************** AM/FM ***********************************