Negus is a title of Ethiopian Emperor Haile Selassie, the Almighty God of the Rastafarian movement, and no one pays him more eloquent homage than Ras Michael and his group, the Sons of Negus. This is the beat of the heart, based on the original "instrument of ten strings," the hand-beaten drum. On 1975's Dadawah, Michael took a religious ceremonial gathering as the basis for an album of elegant poetry with raw, visceral power. Later, eschewing minimalism, such works as Promised Land Sounds added electronics; it produced a primeval neo-psychedelia rivaled only by the experiments of Lee Perry. ~ Roger Steffens