Sons Of Kemet

For London music agitator Shabaka Hutchings, any of his adventures is an opportunity to combat the clichés surrounding any musical style: everyone can go beyond orthodoxy, they all rub shoulder with one another, and everyone is signified and resignified by the sound that surrounds them. 

And at the centre of this sonic earthquake of infinite replicas his figure as the shaman of new jazz always emerges, earned by his status as spiritual leader in Shabaka and the Ancestors, The Comet is Coming and, above all, Sons of Kemet, the most popular project of this saxophonist and clarinettist, the gateway to a vibrant scene that goes beyond the limits of what we thought contemporary jazz was until now. Suddenly its discourse, speaks to everyone thanks to Hutchings.

This is the only way to explain why Sons of Kemet's latest album, Black to the Future, has been singled out on all fronts as one of this year's greatest albums, no matter the genre. It's not a niche album, it doesn't orbit in its own cosmos, you don't have to know anything before pressing play: as soon as it starts playing, with Hutchings and his band accompanied by Moor Mother, Kojey Radical and Lianne La Havas, the follow up to Your Queen is a Reptile pounces on you like a universal musical language.