Martha Reeves
Martha Reeves

Amerigo Gazaway’s *Soul Mates* series continues the theme of his previous work in creating collaborations that never were. On the series’ latest installment, Amerigo unites Brooklyn rapper Yasiin Bey (Mos Def) and soul legend Marvin Gaye for a dream collaboration aptly titled “Yasiin Gaye”. Building the album's foundation from deconstructed samples of Gaye’s Motown classics, Gazaway re-purposes the instrumentation into new productions within a similar framework. Carefully weaving Bey’s tangled raps and Gaye’s soulful vocals over his new arrangements, the producer delivers a quality much closer to an authentic collaboration than a lukewarm "mashup" album.

The popular Jazz Is Dead series has put out a wealth of killer tunes headed up by Adrian Younge and now a bunch of them get revisited for this special remix album. It reads like a who's who of contemporary jazz players and opens with none other than broken beat maestro Kadi Tatham. His take on Marcos Valle's 'Gotta Love Again' is a real joy, while there are low fi beat delights from Pink Sifu, chopped up sounds from Cut Chemist and a gloriously sunny and upbeat version of Doug Carn's 'Windfall' by Natureboy Flako who produced Fatima's excellent last album.