Raggae

Jazz-funk/fusion album by Japanese drummer, Akira Ishikawa. Featuring percussion-heavy versions of ‘Let's Start’, ‘Bongo Rock’ and ‘Pick Up The Pieces’. 'Back To Rhythm’ was the final recording in Ishikawa’s African-influenced period. He cut this record with his band ‘Count Buffalos’, featuring Kiyoshi Sugimoto, Takeru Muraoka, Larry Sunaga and arranger Hiromasa Suzuki. Includes excellent cover versions of The Beatles, Simon & Garfunkel, BT Express, Stevie Wonder, Average White Band, Incredible Bongo Band and Fela Kuti.

57th & 9th is the twelfth solo studio album by British singer-songwriter Sting, his first rock album in 13 years, released on 11 November 2016. The album sold over 600,000 copies worldwide in 2016. Japanese exclusive edition of "57th & 9th" release from Sting additionally includes six Japan only bonus tracks, which are live ones taken from a concert held in November 2016 at Bataclan in Paris and available as CD format for the first time.

You really must get this and all their albums (this is really their third, the first is hard to find). This latest effort captures more of their live show power…

Ever attuned to what is happening out there in recordland, Herb Alpert tried to graft his trumpet onto the rhythms and textures of hip-hop and techno-dance music in North On South St., hoping again to crash the R&B charts. He used four young black co-producers (Greg Smith, Robert Jerald, Jimmy B and Troy Staton) and they get some festively percolating grooves going on tracks like "Passion Lady" and "Paradise 25." Clearly Alpert's early jazz leanings were beckoning more strongly, and his Miles Davis-like musings over the dance tumult actually anticipated the acid-jazz movement later in the decade, making this a historically important record. Yet there is something melancholy about Alpert's playing on this album, like a lonely figure from the past looking in on a party from an outside window on the street, genuinely wanting to join in but unable to totally connect…

Although he doesn't often get the same level of attention and critical acclaim that fellow Jamaican producers like Lee "Scratch" Perry receive, Bunny "Striker" Lee was every bit as influential, particularly on the dub scene, where his output was so generous that labels were created to handle it, including Jackpot Records, formed in the 1970s by Trojan Records to provide a conduit for Lee's dub cuts. This fine archival set gathers some of the best and most interesting of these sides, all of which were created and originally released between 1974 and 1976.

A little more than a year after the release of his 57th & 9th solo LP, Sting is just about ready to release his next project — and it marks another creative turn in a career filled with them. Per official press release, the former Police frontman has teamed with reggae fusion artist Shaggy for 44/876, a new "collaborative, island-influenced album" that promises to honor "the duo’s mutual love of Jamaica — its music, the spirit of its people and vibrancy of its culture."

Soul Jazz Records’ are releasing their long-out-of-print album ‘Hustle! Reggae Disco’ in a new expanded 2017 edition which now features five extra tracks. This ground-breaking album features non-stop killer reggae versions of original funk and soul classics in a disco style. Reggae disco updates of seminal classics by Anita Ward (‘Ring My Bell’), Chaka Khan (‘I’m Every Woman’), Michael Jackson ‘Don’t Stop ‘til You Get Enough,’ Sugarhill Gang (‘Rappers Delight’ here performed by Derrick Laro & Trinity for producer Joe Gibbs) and more, all showing the hidden but inseparable link between the dance floors of New York, Kingston and London.