14 days

Review: Building on the heat of last year's "Devil Made Me Do It", Alex Puddu's Afro Soul Prophecy returns with more smoking jazz fusions. "Red Light District" is as hot and illicit as the title suggests thanks to its prominent drums and heated horn work. "The Game Of Love" plays the perfect counter with its much softer, sentimental swoons and loungey dynamics. Instant summer soul soothers.

Review: Chicago eight-piece Hypnotic Brass Ensemble return with their first album in the best part of 10 years. Maturing with age, experience and decoration, they're even more rich, measured and magic than ever before. Our souls are arrested from the moment the slow spell-binding arpeggio of "Lead The Way" ignites the smouldering journey and the dreamy drama doesn't let up until the final whirling synth echoes of the finale track "Royalty". Highlights include the yearning trumpets and pensive plucks of "Midnight", the insistency and pace of "Heaven & Earth" and the playful swooning signature switches on "Now". Once again, a truly singular trip from the Cohran brothers. Essential.

Review: Long-serving West African artist Angelique Kidjo has pushed the boat out on "Remain In Light", a radical re-imagining of Talking Heads' 1980 album of the same name produced in conjunction with Jeff Bhasker (a "superstar producer" best known for his work with Kanye West and Taylor Swift). In some ways, it has the same inventiveness as Talking Heads' original, it's just that Kidjo and Bhasker have added waves of glistening, West African guitars, intergalactic electronic flourishes, spacey synths and, of course, the effortless soulfulness of the artist's own superb vocals. Highlights include an arresting version of "Born Under Punches (The Heat Goes On)", a wild Afrobeat rendition of "Crosseyed & Painless" fused with Fela Kuti's "Lady" and a total overhaul of "Once In A Lifetime" that's worth the entrance price on its own.

Review: A dinky seven inch brimming with funkalicious delights from the Agogo Records camp here, as Catania's captain of the edits Fab Samperi drops two essential dancefloor tweaks for the Hannover label. The A Side sees Samperi turn to his attentions to "Hard Work" a little 2011 B Side gem from Smoove & Turrell, finessing the original's Northern Soul stomp into a smoother slice of soul infused breaks. Grip the flip where Samperi flips the script, turning smouldering downtempo of The Soul Session's "Soul Desire" into a swing blessed uptempo refix augmented by some deft B-Boy touches.

Review: New Zealand broken beat soul troupe Sola Rosa served up their sixth album late last year. Now redelivered on vinyl, the 180g weight really brings the earth to their rich funk and versatility. Flickering and flipping from heart-melting soul ("Both Of Us") to party-minded deep funk ("Till We Get It Together", "Till The Sun") via lolloping Amp Fiddler-style street soul ("Right On Time"), Magnetics is the sound of band who know each other's strengths and abilities intimately and play to them incredibly well.

Review: Tapioca Discos get a chance to shine on the Kampana imprint's latest vinyl release destined for Brazilian diggers. The edits they've served up here are superb.A-side "Preto Velho" is a suitably percussive affair, with sun-soaked samba guitar riffs, disco bass and ear-catching male vocals riding an off-kilter, carnival-ready rhythm track. Over on side B, "Tartarugue" is a horn-heavy tropical treat that sits somewhere between samba, jazz-funk and Afrobeat.