Ragga Jungle Anthems Volume 2 (Greensleeves, 1996)

How do you rate an album from a genre you don't care for very much?  Easy -- you just say that it sucks.  Just keep in mind that this is not an impartial opinion.   Jungle -- with its hyper-kinetic "urban" beats -- has more in common with dancehall than it does with roots (although some of the songs here incorporate roots vocals) and more in common with modern dub (as opposed to the rootsy '70s dub) than with dancehall and more in common with drum & bass/techno than with modern dub.  Thus, although it has its roots in reggae, jungle is about as far from its mother genre as heavy metal is from Little Richard.  Actually, modern dub, drum & bass, techno, house, trip-hop, and hip-hop can all trace their origins through reggae, but jungle attempts to make the connection more obvious than, say, drum & bass, by adding reggae and dancehall vocal samples.  These tracks claim to be remixes, but to me, they sound more like original songs with some sampled lyrics thrown in for effect.  The super-fast beats are pure energy and effective if, I suppose, you want to get your aggressions out by pummeling something, but I can't see dancing to it or enjoying it musically.  The beats are stale, recycled hip-hop beats sped up, the digital effects are dull in comparison to dub, and the only songs that are moderately likeable are the remixes of ones you already like (e.g., Dawn Penn's "No No No" or Bounty Killer's "Junglist Pon Chalice in Buckingham Palace" -- AKA "Smoke the Herb") or ones that do anything moderately unique and/or musical, like the G Funk Remix of Barrington Levy's "Here I Come."