It's an interesting period for British jazz outliers, with acts such as Sons of Kemet, Melt Yourself Down and The Comet Is Coming all making striking music. United Vibrations drummer Yussef Dayes and keyboardist Kamaal Williams are part of this new breed, and their coming together for Black Focus has produced an album of thrills and delights.
This is a rereading of 1970s jazz-funk through the bass-heavy thump and bump of new-school club culture. You get some sweeping, mesmerising sounds as Dayes's rough, rumbling, frantic percussive pulses provide the ballast for Williams's symphony of synths and strings. Be it the sunny-side-up groove they dig on the title track or the softly lined punch and drama of Yo Chavez, the duo bend and twist to where the drums and keys take them.
The result is a record full of excitement and diversity. A job done well.
