Montreal-based Chadian producer, singer and guitarist Caleb Rimtobaye, aka Afrotronix, fuses ancestral African tradition with future-facing electronics. KÖD expands his exploration of the sounds of his homeland – weaving tama and other hand percussion, sampled Chadian call-and-response singing, and more, into his ear-grabbing electronic compositions. The album balances the familiar, from desert blues guitar licks to Sahelian polyrhythms, with outlandish and experimental programmed elements.
Opener ‘Incertitude’ kicks things off in fine fashion with treated vocal samples, hand percussion and squelchy synth refrains. The addition of a clutch of guest vocalists mixes things up and adds even more colour to proceedings.
Category: world
The excellent quintet WÖR utilises violin, bagpipes, accordion, guitar and saxophones to reimagine 18th-century tunes from the Flanders region of Belgium. Swedish women’s self-styled ‘Folk’appella’ quartet Kongero honour the folk traditions of their home region, Jämtland, in northern Sweden, in a similar manner.
Here, these two ensembles combine for a tantalising project. The sonic landscapes on display are beautifully produced and virtuosically played. ‘Var är du?’ rolls with bucolic wonder, the instruments of WÖR blending perfectly with the voices of Kongero. ‘Schoon Lief’ is a wistful, soft and gently evolving number evocative of winter mists and bright, clear skies, while ‘Ridder & Jungfrun’ presents a drifting…
Less than a year after her luscious solo debut, Pacífico Maravilla, Nidia Góngora returns, this time as the frontwoman of Nuevos Ríos. Alongside her are members of her longtime group, Canalón de Timbiquí, and Toulouse-based Reco Reco, an ensemble that focuses on plugged-in renditions of South American styles. Together, the collective perform lively, electrified versions of music from Góngora and Canalón de Timbiquí’s finely honed repertoire, continuing to bear witness to the traditions and lifeways of the Pacific coast of Colombia for audiences worldwide.
Nuevos Ríos’ self-titled debut is nothing short of astonishing, a clear continuation of the work Góngora and her compatriots have long been doing, and yet something that feels wholly new.
From joyful dancefloor productions to funky Afro-pop, reggae and gorgeously melancholic numbers, David Walters’ new album is an expansive affair. With a gang of guest producers including Captain Planet, Blundetto and Art of Tones onboard, the Franco-Caribbean multi-instrumentalist continues along the vein of his 2023 Soul Tropical album: a maximalist channeling of eclectic Afro-Caribbean themes, so brightly coloured that it often masks the personal burdens carried in his lyrics.
Always a great collaborator, Walters is joined by Fatoumata Diawara, Keziah Jones and Philo, who add their wonderful vocal talents to standout songs. However, the soul of the record remains Walters’ clear voice and guitar, the full-bodied production never obscuring how…
The first 2026 release from Adrian Younge and Ali Shaheed Muhammad’s Jazz Is Dead label is a collaboration with legendary Brazilian singing/songwriting duo Antonio Carlos & Jocafi. The pair — both from Salvador, Bahia — have been working together since the late 1960s and have not only recorded their own hits but delivered them for dozens of other artists as well. This is the pair’s first new recording since the 1990s. Muhammad and Younge were in Brazil in 2022 when they were introduced to Antonio Carlos & Jocafi by Baiana System’s Beto Barreto. The men hit it off and made tentative plans to record together. In 2025 Antonio Carlos & Jocafi came to play the Jazz Is Dead club. Younge and Muhammad set them up in their studio with a hip band, and a backing…
Kinshasa isn’t the kind of city that waits for you to be ready, the city just takes over your experience. It is a metropolis of staggering contradictions, where the ghosts of Belgian colonialism collide with the relentless, vibrating hustle of hyper-capitalism. To attempt to capture the essence of this place on tape seems like a fool’s errand, yet this is exactly what the Kinshasa-based street art collective KINACT have achieved with their debut LP, Kinshasa in Action. Founded in 2015 by Eddy Ekete, KinAct first made their name not on stage, but in the gutters, markets, and intersections of the Congolese capital. They transformed public spaces into living, breathing theatres of the absurd, constructing elaborate regalia from the city’s discarded detritus, bottles, wires, tires, and dismembered…
Since its inception in 2002, independent label Soundway Records has unearthed coveted musical gems from far-flung corners of the world, with foundations that are rooted in meticulously sourced reissues. A collection of fourteen digital reggae, deep roots and dub rarities from the Nigerian underground, spotlighting a time when Jamaican reggae entwined with Nigerian styles, politics and consciousness, creating a bridge between Lagos and Kingston. Fight the Fire is a companion piece to Soundway’s seminal “Doing it in Lagos” and “Nigeria Special” compilations, celebrating the innovation and musical experimentation of Nigeria in the 80s. Features rare tracks from key figures of the time including Oby Onyioha (with a crucial Burning Spear cover) and Orits Williki.
Humanity’s future — or so we are told — is dependent on technological advances, powered by millions upon millions of computer chips, the primary components of which can be found only in rare-earth deposits. Brazil is among the most important chess pieces in the globalist metagame; it’s home to nearly a quarter of the world’s rare-earth reserves, with next to no regulation (but plenty of corruption and deforestation).
No Ritmo da Terra, the brilliant new album from São Paulo producer and sound designer Antropoceno, is a musical projection of this future, constructed in part as a warning and, mostly, as a statement of Latin American resilience in the face of colonialism. By bridging Brazilian folk and Amazonian field recordings with…
Intensely expressive free-verse vocal laments over sliding violins, hammered santouri, guitar, and oud – the hybrid sounds of the Mediterranean in the early 20th century.
“Aman Aman” cry the singers on these recordings, their voices preserved on 78rpm discs cut between 1911-1935. The phrase roughly translates to “mercy,” a call of despair, but also one of joy and admiration. On many of these sides, that full range of emotion is transmitted at once.
Some of these artists are legends, others lost to time. Nearly half are female vocalists, a big part of the Cafe Aman tradition but not as well represented on contemporary releases. All were affected by conflicts leading up to the Asia Minor Catastrophe of 1923, and the forced…
Sacred Lodge is the side project of Paris-based producer/sound artist Matthieu Ruben N’Dongo. Rooted in his ethnomusicological research, which explores the role of music in ritual contexts and his own Equatoguinean heritage, the results are unsettling but compelling, characterised by heady percussion and swarming electronics.
But while his 2019 debut Hijos Del Sol was made up of murky downtempo instrumentals, N’Dongo’s follow-up amps up the intensity almost beyond recognition, with a collection of sludgy, abrasive tracks.
One of the starkest differences is the use of vocals, which have previously only featured as echoey background textures. On Ambam, N’Dongo makes full use of his voice. Inspired by…
Kiss Facility is the duo of Emirati-Egyptian singer and songwriter Mayah Alkhateri and producer Salvador Navarrete, aka Sega Bodega, close collaborator of Shygirl and Oklou. Together, they make spellbinding Arabic alt-pop that bridges elements of shoegaze, trip-hop, post-punk, and deconstructed club. The result? A gothic romance with all the poetic gravity of Arabic songcraft and none of the hang-ups of tradition. KHAZNA, meaning “treasure” or “vault” in Arabic, contains passages of unerring devotion and romantic mysticism alongside vows of mutual destruction such that Kiss Facility’s khazna begins to more resemble an impassioned prison.
The springy synths and chugging guitar riffs that open “Lynch” are promptly assuaged by…
Many extraordinary works fade quietly into obscurity, only to be rediscovered years later. Roland Brival’s Créole Gypsy belongs firmly to this overlooked category, a staggering, deeply political, and intensely beautiful work of Pan-Caribbean spiritual jazz that has remained a ghost in the annals of music history since 1980. Now, rescued from obscurity and newly remastered by Soundway Records, this holy grail of Antillean music finally demands the reckoning it has always deserved. Appreciating Créole Gypsy begins with understanding the life and perspective of its creator. Born in 1950 in Fort-de-France, Martinique, music represents just one dimension of Roland Brival’s versatility. He is a celebrated novelist, poet, literature critic, painter,…
Coming off two excellent records released on Habbi Funk that showed off his skills as a beatmaker, sample wrangler, song crafter and arranger, the Lebanese musician Charif Megarbane teamed with the Indonesian trio Ali to make a record. Tirakat is the result of the pairing and it’s brilliant. Organic, genre-bending, flowing and free, the album was recorded in three days’ time and feels like a well-curated journey through an amazing record collection. They jump all over the map, trip through time, and visit as many styles as possible, all with a mix of precision and spontaneity that makes the record a joy to listen to.
They venture into disco on “Mosaics”, Arabic funk on “Kuda Arab”, tender balladry on Ahmad’s Lament”, dancehall reggae on…
Almost three years after the release of É Soul Cultura, Vol. 2, Luke Una harvests another unmixed crop of deep dancefloor truffles that spans decades, genres, and continents. The well-traveled U.K. underground club institution asserts his intent with track one, “Spread Love” – impelling disco-funk from Harris & Orr, a duo on the same wavelength as Gil Scott-Heron & Brian Jackson.
The ’90s and 2020s are each represented with two cuts, including DJ Harvey’s aloft and beatless mix of DJ Food’s “Peace” and a shadowy downtempo gem from Fatdog. All else dates from the latter half of the ’70s through the late ’80s, and though there’s wide variety even among what was made within close proximity, a dialogue of sorts occurs from track to track.
As AI becomes an increasing threat to humans trying to make a living from creative activities, Nubiyan Twist’s latest album is a defiant riposte. It is a celebration of the joyful energy and chaos that comes from musicians getting together in a room to play. While that could imply a scrappy sound, it would be a wildly inaccurate description of the ensemble. Chasing Shadows represents a skilful interception of jazz, afrobeat, R&B and electronics, fused with a mastery that reflects the nine-piece band’s background having formed in 2011 while studying at the Leeds College of Music.
Their fifth album resists the temptation of indulging in extended jams, all eleven tracks timing around the four-minute mark. New vocalist, Eniola Idowu, brings an extra soulful touch…
Following Léve Léve Vol. 1, this second volume continues a long-term exploration of the popular music of São Tomé and Príncipe, with a clear focus on rhythm, movement and dancefloor energy. Curated by Tom B., Léve Léve Vol. 2 brings together emblematic recordings from the 1970s and ’80s, carefully restored and remastered, designed as much for close listening as for DJ use.
The compilation deepens and completes the first volume by returning to key groups such as Sangazuza, Conjunto Equador, Africa Negra and Pedro Lima, while also unveiling previously unreleased or hard-to-find tracks. Across the record, puxa and socopê rhythms unfold with remarkable intensity, capturing these bands at the height of their powers: tight…
The Israeli-born Ben Aylon won a Best Artist nomination in the Songlines World Music Awards for his 2021 album Xalam.
That recording was a labour of love, the culmination of a decade studying the xalam and kamalengoni while recording in Senegal.
This follow-up takes his musical adventures to the next level, with his own rhythmic and increasingly assured playing augmented by some of West Africa’s finest voices.
Cheikh Lô takes the lead on the slinky, orchestrated mbalax of ‘Terranga’, and Dobet Gnahoré’s husky tones grace ‘Nan You’, which mixes African and electronic influences to fine effect. Elsewhere, the soulful former Super Diamono singer Omar Pene and the Ethiopian-Israeli…
Hailing from Côte d’Ivoire but now based in Berlin, we first came across the balafon player Aly Keïta as part of the Trio Ivoire, whose 2000 debut album was an intriguing exercise in Afro-jazz fusion. Since then, he’s made a number of impressive albums, both solo and collaborative, bridging contemporary jazz and African tradition. But this mostly instrumental set may just be his finest to date. Recorded with a new trio featuring Dutch drummer Marcel van Cleef and Italian bassist Roberto Badoglio, the balafon has rarely sounded so versatile: deeply rooted in African tradition and yet infused with a cosmic, futuristic twist. On ‘Farafinko’, for example, Keïta locks into a timeless West African groove in the style of the Malian virtuoso Lassana Diabaté,…
Taracá is the 15th album by 17-time Latin Grammy winner, Uruguayan singer/songwriter Jorge Drexler. His first in four years, it marks his first time recording at home in two decades. Its contents offer a return to root sounds, in particular candombe. Candombe is a drum-based musical style that originated among the enslaved African population of capital Montevideo, and is based on Bantu African drumming. The musical style was racially marginalized and even banned over its existence (as were Brazilian samba and American blues) but survived, evolved, and in the 21st century, thrived. Like the aforementioned styles, candombe is at an ascendant moment in 21st century popular culture. Drexler plays homage to his recently deceased father here; to that end…
French flautist, saxophonist and composer Jocelyn Mienniel presents a cross-cultural collaboration built upon improvisation and self-imposed limits. Bringing together musicians from five continents, Mienniel and company gave themselves just four hours to experiment together around pre-agreed frameworks before performing the results live that same evening.
Delicate kora, flute, voice, strings and tinkling hand bells coalesce on opener ‘Alalake’, which slowly evolves in hypnotic spirals. The upbeat ‘Hojdaren’ skips and dances, underpinned by some beautiful violin, while ‘Zerberb’ pulses with shuffling beats and swirling percussion. ‘Takamba’ evokes the music of the Andes, filtered through a West African lens. This is wonderfully…