Shabaka
Perceive Its Beauty, Acknowledge Its Grace
(Impulse!)
★★★

 
IT turns out that not only has British jazz pioneer Shabaka Hutchings disbanded two of his critically acclaimed groups — the incendiary Sons Of Kemet and intergalactic The Comet Is Coming — he has also retired his primary weapon of choice, the saxophone.

Instead, starting with his 2022 EP Afrikan Culture, Hutchings has taken up the Shakuhachi, a Japanese flute, and other flutes from around the world.

Recorded in Rudy Van Gelder’s famous New Jersey jazz studio, and assisted by VIPs like Moses Sumney, Floating Points and fellow flute apprentice Andre 3000, his debut album is a set of mesmerising soundscapes, including some tracks with vocalists (Saul Williams’s spoken word effort is particularly striking).

Like Bob Dylan in the ’60s there is a sense of an artist constantly on the move, making it an exciting time to be a fan of Hutchings.

Neil Young & Crazy Horse
F##kin’ Up
(Warner)
★★★★

IN one of the spoken-word interludes on his 2014 record A Letter Home, Neil Young speaks to his dead mother: “I’ll be there eventually. Not for a while though. I still have a lot of work to do here.”

True to his word, the 78-year-old Canadian-American singer-songwriter has released 12 studio and 18 archival albums since then.

Which brings us to F##kin’ Up, a 2023 live version of Neil Young & Crazy Horse’s 1990 fan favourite Ragged Glory, recorded in a Toronto club with the Nils Lofgren-edition of the Horse plus Micah Nelson.

The songs have all been renamed, with the band making one helluva racket capturing the original set’s glorious garage-grunge — check out the title track’s filthy guitars.

This is rock ’n’ roll music intended to be played with the volume turned up to 11.

David Ian Roberts
David Ian Roberts
(Cambrian Records)
★★★★

DAVID IAN ROBERTs goes from strength to strength, with his new self-titled album arguably his best yet.

Recorded in what the Cardiff-based singer-songwriter called “that strange post-pandemic daze where we were all kind of putting our lives back together,” it’s another striking set of original pastoral folk music.

As with his previous records, Roberts plays a host of instruments including guitars, piano, drums, synths, electric bass and dulcimer, his musical world-making helped along by Annie Perry (clarinet, flute), Kirsten Miller (cello), Aidan Thorne (double bass) and David Grubb (violin, viola).

There are still echoes of Nick Drake but his sounds feels like it has evolved, seeming closer to the quieter moments on Elbow’s 2001 debut Asleep In The Back — check out the Guy Garveyesque vocals and wonderful strings on Lost On Me, or Safety’s melancholic grandeur.