Olive ‘Senya’ Grant makes Horace Andy’s Please Don’t Go her own.
Family Man at the controls, on Clive Chin’s ticket.

‘What would happen if Erykah Badu, DJ Screw and Sa-Ra had a baby? You’d get Liv.e’ (NPR).
‘Martian soul music’ (Fader).

This saxophonist came through with the likes of Roy Ayers and Joe Henderson in the sixties, before hooking up with Steve Lacy in Paris in 1973. In this soundtrack composed for a film by his friend Joaquin Lledó — entitled Le Sujet Ou Le Secrétaire Aux Mille Et Un Tiroirs — he was joined by members of the group around Lacy, and diverse co-conspirators including friends from the funk outfit Ice, French accordionist Joss Bassellion, and none other than Jef Gilson at the mixing desk. It’s a dazzling, intensely entertaining blend of modal, cosmic and spiritual jazz, free funk, dirty grooves, heavy jams, bistro boogie and Javanese wah-wah.

Highly sought-after French jazz fusion — blending in West Coast funk, gentle blues, sketches of Andalusia — with John Hicks, Jerry Goodman from the Mahavishnu Orchestra, and Jean-Marie Fabiano from the Fabiano Orchestra.

From 1977.
‘Music of extreme sophistication yet perfect lucidity… A Zen-like tranquillity pervades this album of duets’ (Richard Williams in Melody Maker).
‘Quite an achievement, balancing fantasy and friction with grace as a fulcrum… calm, lucid, colourful, and captivating’ (Art Lange in Coda).

Wildly compelling tapestry of free jazz, dubby electronics, marimba grooves, funk, blues and African folk, recorded in Philadelphia in 1972.
‘My ancestors eventually show up in my music every time I play. I’ve always said that my backyard is Africa.’

Top-notch mid-seventies spiritual jazz; steeped in Trane. Championed by Jazzman.
Billy — aka William X, nowadays Khalim Zarif — was a Jazz Messenger. Around the same time as this recording, he was one of the Cosmic Brotherhood supporting Jackie McLean on his New York Calling LP, also for SteepleChase; another lost classic.
Warmly recommended.

Originally released by Gallo in 1974, this is a raw, impassioned, stunning set led by bop pianist Kirk Lightsey (a regular sideman for Chet Baker) and saxophonist Rudolph Johnson (from Black Jazz), on a break from touring South Africa with Detroit crooner Lovelace Watkins.
A heavy-duty excursion into post-Coltrane spiritual modernism, ranging from the modal, cerebral intensity of the side-long title track Habiba, to the downhome breakbeat groove of There It Is, and the dark glitter of minor-key waltz Fresh Air. Long one of the most desired global jazz LPs, and never before available outside South Africa, Habiba is a forgotten masterpiece of its era.

Deep, vibesing, rootical excursions in Brazilian percussion, especially berimbau; originally released by Saravah in 1973.
Newly remastered from the master tapes; gatefold sleeve.
Fabulous.

The truly iconic compilation from 1965, when ska was in its full, irrepressible, post-colonial glory.

Hypnotic variations of the compositions of the legendary Mohamed Abdel Wahab, on early electronic keyboards like the Steelphon S900 and the Farfisa, cut with El Shariyi’s hip, whizzy jazz and pop stylings. Ana Wa Habibi is here; and the classic Ahwak, made famous by Abdel Halim Hafez and Fairuz. Originally released by Soutelphan in 1976.

Creole poetry, rootical mysticism and heavy-grooving synths illuminate this survey of the Martiniquan’s first four albums, recorded in France in the late seventies and early nineties, but inspired by the ‘smells and colours… subliminal noises… fruity notes, the memories of funeral wakes, the bombastic organ of the cathedral and the gasps of the drums’ of home.
‘Midonet’s musical world is cosmic, mystical and he has created his own idiosyncratic style around it: not plain folk, not bélé, chouval bwa, beguine or gwoka, but rather a transcendental fusion of all these and a true reflection of his personality.’

Cosmic jazz excursions on saxophone, flute, electric keys, synths and drums.
Supple, deep and spacious; sparklingly dubwise; intensely percussive.

Precious, early solo work by the veteran sound explorer, instrument builder and improv grandmaster. Intricate and graceful manipulations of the echoes generated by a home-made regiment of glass tubes called Analapos, these recordings tunnel divergently like subterranean streams, while the Koolmees pair take wing with aerial fragility, like a newly formed birdsong.