The latest album by one of the biggest in the rapidly emerging and developing Afrobeats scene. His last album and its hit single Essence helped to bringing Afrobeats into the view of the greater public. He follows this album up with a another solid collection of groovy and moody songs. This album also has a stronger influence from African music in, comparison to the last album’s more neo-soul inspired sound, with heavy inspirations from South African music. This also has interesting colloborations with Don Tolliver and a great verse from Skepta. Another good album in the Afrobeats scene that ultimatley doesn’t reach the heights of the genres best albums.

AKAI SOLO proves once again why he is one of the most underrated artists in even the underground scene. AKAI has worked with some of the biggest and most taleneted artists on the underground including features with Moor Mother and billy woods and collab album with Pink Siifu. This album shows his solo talents with only one feature by Armand Hammer. He has the abstract, lo-fi and drumless production present in lots of albums in this scene in the underground. He sets himself apart with his deadpan and detailed rapping. This mood of this album matches the album cover very well feeling moody, abstract, dense and psychedelic. A good album to get into the underground scene and probably AKAI SOLO’s best solo album.

Mysterious British musical collective dropped 4 new albums on streaming and one on bandcamp. I’ve yet to listen to their bandcamp album but the 4 on streaming truly shows their talent and verstaility. The members is a mystery with the only known memebers being Inflo as the producer and Cleo Sol and Kid Sister contributing to vocals.

11 is Sault’s more typical neo-soul sound. It also draws influences from reggae. All the tracks are very groovy and have well thought structures with many songs reaching the 5 minute mark.

Aiir is a follow up to their previous album Air. It again is essentially a classical album heavy string production and choral vocals. This album reaches absolute beautiful highs and is a more impressive sequel to Air.

Earth is another neo-soul album with more influences from African music. This is probably my favourite of the 4 albums with beautiful production and vocals and spiritual lyrics.

The final album Today & Tomorrow sees them venturing into rock music. The album experiments with many rock sounds including funk, boogie, psychedelic and punk. While maybe not as complete or measured as their other albums this experimentation with rock creates a really interesting album with amazing grooves.

This quarter of album shows the versaility of one of the most mysterious and interesting artists right now.

This soundtrack for the new Black Panther film explores the sounds of African and South American music. Controversially, I also prefer this to the original Black Panther Soundtrack curated by Kendrick Lamar. This album feels much more thematically appropriate for Black Panther. It features two Rihanna songs showing she hasn’t falted in quality at all in 6 years. It also features albums from Afrobeats and South African house arists and South American folk music. Another Interlude is the moody and lyrical Interlude by Stormzy. All the songs in her bringing a varied sound while still feeling thematic and appropriate for Black Panther.

Nas somehow does it again with his 4th album in three years produced by Hit-Boy. At 50 years old Nas sounds more hungry then over with 17 tracks and 0 features. This is first time he’s had an album with no features since the Lost Tapes which was a collection of previously unreleased songs. Acorss 50 minutes Nas brings non-stop flows and lyrics. This album lyrically sees Nas album to take a more mature and reflective approach looking back at his 4 decades in the music industry. Hit-Boy has some of his best production on this album with highlights including the double header Legit and Thun and the punchy horns on Til My Last Breath. Nas brings some of his best lyrics especially on the tracks WTF SMH and Once a Man, Twice a Child. While I may not like this as much as the moody and concise Magic this is my favourite album in the his King’s Disease series.