With her highly anticipated ninth album A Danger to Ourselves arriving in just under two months, Lucrecia Dalt has shared the third single from the album, ‘caes’, a dense and thunderous piece featuring the evocative voice of Mexican sound artist Camille Mandoki. Dalt cites Ana Mendieta and Evelyn McHale as poetic inspirations, tying the song’s lyrical content to meditations on legacy and tragedy. “Musically, I wanted to hint at a slowed-down and diluted dembow, but with a melodic energy that felt ancient,” she noted, continuing:
“It features my dear friend Camille. She has a unique voice that is rare to hear nowadays. I love it when female voices carry a certain depth, and they don’t spend too much time in the upper, breathy register. Poetically, it’s an amalgamation of various references; it examines the legacy of one’s life through the lens of tragedy. Ana Mendieta and Evelyn McHale were specific figures, in my mind.”
The single is offered with an accompanying video, shot between the American Southwest and Mexico City, which captures the same sense that Dalt describes: “It is in the act of surrendering oneself to falling that the total, the sublime, enters?”
Watch the video below and grab A Danger to Ourselves when it lands on September 5th through RVNG Intl.
It’s been over a decade since Mulatu Astatke released a full-length studio album. Lucky for us, this September, he returns with Mulatu Plays Mulatu, a new record set for release on September 26th through Strut. The album revisits and reworks key pieces from across his career, offering new arrangements that reflect both his musical evolution and enduring vision. Known as the father of Ethio-jazz, Astatke was instrumental in creating a unique fusion of traditional Ethiopian music with jazz and Latin influences during the “Swinging Addis” era. “Throughout my life, I wanted to bring Ethio jazz to all corners of the world for people to enjoy and I feel that I have succeeded in that,” he says.
On Mulatu Plays Mulatu, classics like ‘Yekermo Sew’, ‘Netsanet’ and ‘Kulun’ are reshaped with new arrangements, weaving expanded improvisations and rich textures. The record balances Western jazz structures with traditional Ethiopian instruments including the krar, masenqo, washint, kebero and begena. “Ethio-jazz brings us together and makes us one,” says Astatke. “This album is the culmination of my work bringing this music to the world and pays respect to our unsung heroes, the original musical scientists in Ethiopia who gave us our cultural music.”
Ahead of the album’s release, we can already hear the first splendid single, ‘Netsanet’, a reworking of the classic track meaning “freedom”. It was recorded between London and Addis Ababa, with Astatke working alongside his long-standing UK band, an ensemble shaped through years of live performance and Jazz Village sessions in Addis. Listen to it below.
There’s exciting news from Aki Rissanen, who has just announced his new album Imaginary Mountains. The talented and accomplished Finnish pianist and composer is pushing his piano trio into a rawer, more rhythm-focused, and emotionally honest territory. “The focus this time is more on rhythm and repetition,” Rissanen says. “It feels more direct and physical, maybe even raw at times. But at its core, it’s still me, just seen from a different angle.” Shaped by internal landscapes, visual art, and a sense of geopolitical unrest, the forthcoming album explores contrast and tension with a sharper sound. As he explains, “It’s about the emotional terrain that can keep us from fully engaging or empathising with what’s happening around us”.
The album title also refers to Keith Jarrett’s Personal Mountains. “I loved how he evoked vast, imagined spaces through his music”, Rissanen comments. “In a way, Imaginary Mountains is my own reflection on that idea, landscapes that exist more in the psyche than the physical world.”
We’ll have to wait until September 12th for Imaginary Mountains to drop through Edition Records but we can already hear the first single, ‘For E’. Dedicated to Erik Satie, it offers a striking glimpse of what Rissanen will be throwing at us. The single comes with an accompanying live video, shot by Jori Huhtala and post-produced by Rissanen himself. Watch it below.
And to tide us over until the album drops, listen back to the sublime mixtape Rissanen put together for us in September 2023.
We’re thrilled to hear that Chip Wickham is back with a new album, The Eternal Now, arriving on September 5th through Gondwana Records. Led by the rich, expressive voice of his flute and co-produced by Matthew Halsall, this is Wickham’s most rhythm-forward record yet. To bring the album to life, the immensely talented British flautist, saxophonist, and composer also enlisted the help of Manchester heavyweights Luke Flowers (The Cinematic Orchestra) on drums and Sneaky (Mr Scruff) on bass. Taking inspiration from Lonnie Liston Smith, David Axelrod, Sven Wunder, and library music, the upcoming The Eternal Now explores new rhythms and sounds, while still carrying all the soulful grooves and melodic warmth that have long defined his sound. “Writing this album has been a deliberate journey of exploration and drive into the furthest reaches of creativity,” Chip explains, “an attempt to push myself artistically into new spaces using new colours and new energy.”
Alongside the album news, Wickham has let loose its opener ‘Drifting’, a gorgeous, cinematic and seductive track. “Sometimes in life you just need to let go and drift”, as Wickam describes. “Let the wind move you around, be free, and see where you end up.”
Irish composer and double bassist Caimin Gilmore is widely recognized for his work with ground breaking new music group Crash Ensemble and collaborations across a strikingly diverse musical landscape. An interdisciplinary and versatile modern musician, he has shared the stage with internationally renowned artists like Lisa Hannigan, Dermot Kennedy, Aaron Dessner, Jessy Buckley, Dirty Projectors, Sam Amidon, Greg Saunier, to name a few, and features on over 40 recordings, including releases from Damon Albarn, Boygenius, and on Leonard Cohen’s posthumous album ‘Thanks for the Dance’ with European ensemble s t a r g a z e, among many others. Gilmore is stepping forward with BlackGate, his highly anticipated debut album, arriving on August 1st through New Amsterdam Records in collaboration with Dublin’s Ten Spot Records.
“There has been a long lineage of non classical artists working primarily in ‘commercial’ music who dig from the contemporary classical music well & also write it,” Gilmore explains. He traces his own path to genre fluidity back to a 2019 panel at Cork’s Sounds from a Safe Harbour Festival:
“The first time the idea that this cross pollination was rigorously happening was listening to NewAm Artistic Director William Brittelle at Sounds from a Safe Harbour Festival… That interaction cemented, and made sense of, how ‘classical’ composers and musicians were also working in genre-fluid ways internationally and this gave assurance to the idea that my musical ideas, amassed performing across genres, had credibility as a notated work also.”
Commissioned by Galway’s BlackGate Cultural Centre with support from the Arts Council of Ireland, and developed during a year-long residency with Dublin City Council, BlackGate is a beautifully textured suite for harp, cello, double bass and Yamaha DX7, featuring Kate Ellis (cello) and Lavinia Meijer (harp). The music draws on minimalist structures and extended techniques to build what Gilmore calls a “spectral sound world”, shaped by his life as a performer across contemporary classical, indie, traditional and orchestral music. He comments:
”I was interested in writing a piece that lived somewhere—harmonically and structurally—between indie and minimalist music; using extended string techniques to create a spectral sound world. At the time I was playing and jumping across a broad range of styles—contemporary music, folk/Irish traditional music, playing in indie groups, and symphonic repertoire with orchestras. I felt that the playing techniques I was using across these genres were transferable, and the diffuse sonic worlds were conducive with each other–they could live together if it was a reflection of how I approached them, or maybe how I understood them. It felt most natural to me to write something with this cross pollination of genres in mind. BlackGate as such became a natural reflection of the different types of music and people I was performing and collaborating with at the time of writing it.”
Following on from ‘MVE III’, Gilmore has shared a second track from the album, the gorgeous and heavenly ‘MVE I’. The single arrives with a visual accompaniment by Steve O’Connor. Watch it below and listen to ‘MVE III’ straight after.
Swedish collective Pink Butter are set to release their debut EP Can We Go Back on August 1st through DeepMatter Records. Known for their live, improvisational approach, the outfit of Oskar Bettinsoli (guitar), Björn Lehnert (keys), Malte Bergman (bass), and John Bjurström (drums) blends jazz, hip-hop, and soul into a sound that feels both fluid and groove-focused. Featuring guest appearances from T3 of Slum Village and Jermaine Holmes (D’Angelo), Can We Go Back explores both personal and collective themes. The band comments:
“We made our songs by simply playing together live in the studio, giving as much of ourselves as possible to the music. In an age where digital perfection is easy to achieve, we chose to embrace the human side of music. It’s about capturing the raw energy of the moment—just like the jazz records we love—but infused with the modern collaboration and vibe of today’s hip-hop and soul. It’s a balance between the timelessness of improvisation and the innovation of contemporary music.”
Final single ‘U’ closes the upcoming EP on a high. Featuring Venus Anon and Jermaine Holmes, the track is a lush, bass-heavy slice of neo-soul, full of warmth, groove, and emotion. Here it is.
