Review: TakeFingz returns with its seventh release and offers up a double A-side 7" tailored for dancefloor devastation. On Side A, DJ Katch reworks classic funk breaks into a groove-heavy party igniter that betrays some seriously sharp turntable skills and crowd-moving instincts. It's a surefire weapon for any set in high-energy settings. On the flip, DJ Toby Gee drops a bass-driven boogie funk jam packed with vintage chants and break-heavy grooves. Both tracks are precision-crafted with nods to B-Boy culture among them perfect for bodypoppers and lockers alike.
Review: Berlin's Exit Strategy began their 12"s game releasing EPs in browned sleeves, shortly before branching out into digital-vinyl combo releases with original artwork in the 2020s. Now with over ten years of experience under their belts, they welcome five new artists for a playful bricolage in deep and minimal techno, privileging elite, razor-sharp additive sound design and future-soulful vocal tasters. Ivory's opener 'Rain' epitomises this, while Jimi Jules squelchifies the same formula, and Aera's 'Future Holdings' rolls out the same logic to its ultimate conclusion, veering towards complex, 3D-graphic melodic techno composed entirely of climbing saws.
Review: In a rare backwards castling and killer checkmate, Friendly Records boldly re-press one of J Dilla's most beloved cuts, 'Geek Down', which appeared on his landmark Donuts LP. Known for its sample of the 2001 dark funk tune 'Charlies Theme' by The Jimi Entley Sound, this indelible, ringed hors d'oeuvre was essential for the critics' collective assessment that the 2005 LP was his magnum opus. Trailing pink sprinkles behind it, 'Geek Down' made Dilla's name. Sadly, the title would seem predict the artist's death just three days after the record's release. Dilla was a true productive geekazoid, and it shows in this track, with its untameable, above-the-law Western guitar wahs and tense, lilting strings keeping the goosebump hairs stood aright. The originally sampled track appears on the B, still only part-revealing the magic trick.
Review: 'I'll Take You There' by Leon Mitchison, featuring mixes from Kenny Dope, is a standout release from Kay-Dee Records, in a rare label head-to-head with Now-Again Records. This special edition tosses us an unreleased remix from Kenny Dope, infusing his signature funk-in-the-trunk style into an authentic and primally mixed track, working directly from Mitchison's original 8-track tapes. Acclimatising the first's deeper grooves to Dope's dope, breaks-heavy production, the artist is truly deft at upcycling vintage sonic garms.
Tomoko Kina - "Tie Island" (No Man's Island mix) (5:08)
Review: Japan's Fourth Wave Record Factory sure does know how to serve up brilliantly beguiling sounds that ate you well out of your here and now. Next up is this, 'Dondon Bushi' 7" by Shoukichi Kina, Champloo and Tomoko Kina that explores a mix of Okinawan traditional sounds and modern grooves. The Mbira dance mix of the A-side jam is a bubbly rhythm with worldly percussion and soulful melodies that echo folk majesty and are topped with a wonderful weird vocal from Shoukichi Kina. On the flip, there is a more lazy and downtempo style dub rhythm, 'Tie Island' (No Man's Island mix) which is another worldly trip.
Review: At legendary jazzdance hubs like London's Horseshoe and Camden's Electric Ballroom, one track ruled the floor: Hino Terumasa's 'Merry-Go-Round', pulled from the Japanese trumpeter's 'Double Rainbow' album. A bass-driven jass fusion storm, it sent dancers into a frenzy, tending fast down a psychedelic jazz mountain. A staple of BBE's J Jazz compilation, 'Merry-Go-Round' was Paul Murphy's top pick for a fresh rework, heard here from Niknak. Rising to the challenge, Takumi assembled top-tier musicians to craft an electrifying tribute; eight minutes of unrelenting, steam-hammer funk, pushing jazz dance energy to its limits.
Blacker (The Marden Hill Sweet Green Jam mix) (4:39)
Jam Jah (5:16)
Divine Fact (Blacker 2)
(5:01)
Goodvibes Goodnight (3:28)
Anti-Gun Movement (3:08)
Review: The Ballistic Brothers were behind a great many infusion of breakbeat, jazz and Afro house during the 1990s, smashing onto the scene with the Junior Boy's Own twinkler of an EP, 'I'll Fly Away' (the lead track on which works just as easily at drum & bass speeds as it does at tapper-out tempos) as well as the complementary debut album, London Hooligan Soul. The Eccentric Afros were an early, assistive alias, used by an intermixing but not exhaustive list of some of the same producers involved in TBB before they assumed the latter name proper: Ashley Beedle, Rocky & Diesel (X-Press 2), Uschi Classen and Dave Hill. This second edition of "lost tape" reissues rediscovers some of the trio's best and most esoteric breaks-plates, which would've been heard on heavy rotation in the amalgamate days of the 90s London clubbing scene, yet not all of which have been put out properly until now.
Review: First Word Records thrill us with a brand new album from present-day jazz legend Kaidi Tatham. Miles Away marks his sixth solo full-length for the award-winning London label, with ten fresh tracks all performed by the multi-instrumentalist himself. This is a masterclass in forward-thinking, genre-blurring electronic jazz; Rhodes keys, pianos, synths, strings, horns, and flutes flow floridly over roomy percussion and drum intricacies, representing Kaidi's unmistakable sound. From the smooth funk of 'Misty Garden' to the infectious 'Sweet Cherry Punch', the album redshifts a kaleidoscope of styles: bruk, boogie, soul, and even reggae-steppers on the closing 'Ku Deh'.
Review: Jimi Tenor and Cold Diamond & Mink reunite for another cosmic soul voyage with July Blue Skies, a funk-infused, synth-drenched record out via Timmion Records. Compared to Tenor's previous work, Is There Love In Outer Space?, this one leans into a raw, mystical energy, blending mellow grooves with soundtrack-style funk. Over six immersers, we hear analogue synth extensions across hypothetical planes, evoking a romantic, gridded sky. The infectious 'Sky Train Baby', meanwhile, pulls listeners along a locomotive ride through rivered stars, while 'Venus Of Barsoon' launches into sci-funk territory with drums keeping to a fuzzier logic. On the B, Tenor's flute and sax shine on 'Ikuchi', while the previously released singles 'Summer Of Synesthesia' and 'Tsicroxe' dually release a formerly ambered preservative energy.
Review: The always innovative Emma-Jean Thackray's second album continues her tradition of exploring the edges of standard genres with a bold exploration of grief, selfhood and resilience. Created entirely by Thackray in her South London flat, it meshes jazz, pop, soul, p-funk and grunge into a personal journey in which tracks like 'Wanna Die' contrast frenetic beats with raw emotion while tackling mental health with humour and vulnerability. Featuring collaborations with Reggie Watts and Kassa Overall, the album honours individuality and neurodivergence while processing profound loss and results in Thackray's most intimate and daring work to date-an honest, chaotic, and cathartic celebration of surviving and thriving through pain.
Review: Mille Plateaux and Raster hero Andreas Tilliander meets Fire! Orchestra's Goran Kajfes somewhere deep - and we mean DEEP - in the jazz cosmos. The farthest reaches of a universe far, far away, but one that still seems to understand how joyful vast can sound when pierced by the haunting yet strangely alluring sound of brass. But simply defining this as jazz misses a point, then throws us well beyond the pale. In Cmin would be nothing without the electronic tricks and gadgetry that first made us feel as though we'd space-walked off the edge of the known galaxy, out past the Milky Way's stardust. Echoes, tape delays, things that add mood and timbre without necessarily shouting their presence. There's magic at work here. And, contrary to the 21st Century's obsession with under-the-hood, not knowing the how is the reason why you want this.
Review: Jamaican reggae don Winston Hubert 'Peter Tosh' McIntosh was a core member of the Wailers alongside Bob Marley and Bunny Wailer, but he also had a successful solo career. This Greatest Hits compilation spans his entire Parlophone catalogue with iconic tracks from albums like Johnny B. Goode, Wanted Dread and Alive and Bush Doctor. Originally released in 1987 exclusively in Brazil, this reissue marks its global availability for the first time and it comes on striking red, green, and yellow tri-colour vinyl that helps showcase his powerful blend of reggae, rock and political activism. Tosh's revolutionary spirit and musical mastery were second to none, as this collection proves.
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