Black Focus cover

Black Focus

Released

Across ten tracks, two of them sub-one minute audio sketches, keyboardist/producer Kamaal Williams and drummer Yussef Dayes with a crack team of premier players — Kareem Dayes and Tom Driessler on bass and Mansur Brown, Shabaka Hutchings and Yelfris Valdés on guitar, sax and trumpet respectively — set out their vision of jazz. Black Focus is a musical amalgamation: partly an update of 70s jazz-funk fusion, and partly forward-looking, leading-edge contemporary jazz. Dayes’ impeccably played and pristinely produced drums are at the centre, each tiny sweep of his brushes, every ghost note and moment of percussive intricacy clear in the mix, and Williams’ cosmic synth washes and electric piano lift the whole thing beyond terra firma. A deep, dramatic and potent album that’s all just so classy and effortlessly cool.

Harold Heath

Suggestions
Street Lady cover

Street Lady

Donald Byrd
Ya-Ka-May cover

Ya-Ka-May

Galactic
 Rare Groove Vol. 1 cover

Rare Groove Vol. 1

Various Artists
Quartet cover

Quartet

Brad Mehldau, Pat Metheny
Yellow cover

Yellow

Emma-Jean Thackray
Dave Hubbard cover

Dave Hubbard

Dave Hubbard
Jungle Fire! cover

Jungle Fire!

Pucho & the Latin Soul Brothers
Shout It Out cover

Shout It Out

Patrice Rushen
Love Is Where the Spirit Lies cover

Love Is Where the Spirit Lies

Lon Moshe & Southern Freedom Arkestra
The Guru Walk cover

The Guru Walk

Kirk DeGiorgio
Pedra Do Espia cover

Pedra Do Espia

Itiberê Orquestra Familia
What’s Going On cover

What’s Going On

Dirty Dozen Brass Band