Tags: European

Review: The latest must-cop record from the good people at Big Crown is a real summer special. Bacao Rhythm & Steel Band serve up some seriously soul-enriching grooves, with the impossibly warm and good time vibes that come from steel drums on each and every one. The beats are rooted in funk, with fat bass and expressive horn work bring each one to life. There are sojourns into dub, disco and jazz, and the whole thing bris with so much character and personality that it cannot but put a smile on your face.

Review: The worldly wide Far Our label turns its attention to some fascinating house sounds from Ivan Mamao Conti. "Katmandu" is all bendy bass and tropical drums, steamy humidity and sensuous synths. Pablo Valentino flips it into warm and jazzy number for cosy basement clubs that harks back to the 90s, and Jazzanova then layer in plenty of the golden instrumentals and key playing that makes the music come alive. The closing remix is all Moodymann vibes with its rough kicks and claps, funk bass and lived-in aesthetic. This is classy house music from front to back.

Review: Spanish reissue label Rocafort present this wonderful slice of highlife from Konkolo Orchestra, this time on nice blue wax as well as a plain black version. It's not exactly clear where, or indeed when, exactly the band came from, but their sound is all you need to worry about. 'Blue G' is a lilting, shuffling message of love and support for future generations, and from the message to the effervescent musicality, it's a no-brainer. On the flip, 'That Good Thing' is an instrumental that spirals outwards on the sweetest keys, joyous brass and dreamy guitar, driven by a pattering drum section to radiate good vibes wherever it's played.

Review: A decade of free-spirited jazz, soul, funk and all things in between, Parisian selectors Heavenly Sweetness bring together some of their favourite friends and most talented individuals for an all-out fusion session. Highlights include Anne Wirz's octave bending dulcets on "Mother Of The Future", the roaming trumpet and loose shuffle of Florian Pellissier Quintet's "Valse Pour Helene", Jacaranda Muse's barbed lament "September Sun" and the schoolyard sing-along hip-hop "Want It Back" from the hot-to-trot Guts. Here's to another 10 years...

Review: Isle Of Jura's latest on-point release is a new edition of Zann's sought-after 1990 set "Strange Ways/Inside Jungle", a self-released album of experimental, left-of-centre musical fusions produced in the band's basement studio in Dortmund. The record's genius lies in the band's mixture of Eno/Byrne style ambient motifs, delay-laden electronic beats, densely layered African and South American percussion sounds and chiming instruments from South East Asia. There are some suitably trippy tricks employed here and there - backwards vocals, layered field recordings and so on - but also snaking sax lines and cheery synthesizer melodies. In other words, it's an inspired, hard-to-pigeonhole album that just gets better with each successive listen.

Review: If Tibor Szemzo's name means nothing to you, clearly you've not been listening hard enough to the outer limits of music. The Hungarian polymath has founded impressive sonic art projects - Group 180, Fodderbasis, and Gordian Knot Cinematic Music Lab - and makes a habit of boldly going where very few artists dare to tread, calling on references from sub-Saharan Africa to opera and choral, classical and musique concrete to create a stylistic tapestry all of his own.

It's a patient world he paints, and a vivid one at that. Mesmerising instrumentation switches seamlessly between hypnotic and meditative and more melodic and immediacy accessible. At times Arbo X: Csoma Grooves feels like you've stepped into a Budapest jazz club. A second later, or thereabouts, you've stumbled into an ancient monastery, candlelight glancing off stone walls as night falls outside.

Review: Lebanese singer Pol Seif has linked with various European instrumentalists for this Molo Sayat project , which has its base camp around the Med. The band compose their material in Arabic, Italian and Romani languages and their first release on Zephyrus Records oozes a soul soothing calmness and plenty of colourful folk sounds. The musicianship is second to none as saxophone, clarinet, double bass and trumpets are all blended into one smooth and beautiful soundscape as Serf's voice adds another layer of magic. Whether jazzy and upbeat such as 'Kai Zhas Seka' or slow and mournful like 'Adame' these are all essential sounds.