Pood, Bhud, 'N' Pflug
Duelling Techno

Yellow is an incredible debut album from the multi-instrumentalist who has written, produced and mixed the entire record herself, featuring Emma-Jean Thackray’s vocals throughout alongside guest contributions from choir members.Emma-Jean plays trumpet, but there’s more than just brass in her pocket. She’s a producer, a multi-instrumentalist, a beat-maker, a remixer and a composer, not to mention orchestral composition and DJ sets that bring the heat to the dancefloor. Now, with a debut album that combines stunning harmonies with intricate percussion and solid low-end, alongside the launch of her own Movementt label with Warp providing label services, she can add "label boss" to her already serious arsenal.Emma-Jean studied jazz, classical and composition at UK conservatoires while using Madlib and Ras G records to teach herself beat-making at the same time, studying alongside future dons Moses Boyd, Nubya Garcia and Joe Armon-Jones.

The Caribbean has long been an incubator for the sounds that will animate and shape the culture of the rest of the world for decades to come: From the rhythms of Cuba helping to shape American jazz, blues and rock n’ roll, to Trinidadian calypso introducing a bouncy lightness and gaiety to American party music, to Jamaica’s reggae showing a new way to rebel against convention. But what about the music of Belize, the Caribbean nation that holds the odd position of being a former British colony on the coat of Spanish-speaking Central America? Most people don’t know about the country at all, let alone about the rich sounds it has to offer.Bredda David Obi set out to change that in 1984 with the release of his debut LP No Fear, and the introduction of a new Belizean groove he called kungo (or cungo). A mélange of traditional Belizean brukdown music and sprinklings of the rock, funk, calypso and reggae he had played in various bands during his years as a journeyman musician in the United States. He would further develop this modern tropical sound on subsequent albums, integrating more and more elements from Belizean niche genres like sambai and paranda.Cultures of Soul is proud to take part in documenting Bredda David’s journey into the soul of Belize with an anthology of his early recordings including tracks from No Fear, Cungo Musik (1987) and We No Wa No Kimba Ya (1990) albums.Bredda David’s kungo is hard to describe exactly—its various ingredients make it feel somewhat familiar, but the recipe with which he blends them is slightly strange, fresh and intriguing. But one thing is for certain, it is sure to electrify the dance floor and make everybody jump up and bruk down!

2006’s ‘Trans Canada Highway’ is a crucial EP which explicitly referenced Boards of Canada’s Kraftwerk connection once more, serving to reconnect that link in the wake of 2005’s guitar-led ‘The Campfire Headphase’. If 2002’s ‘Geogaddi’ seemed to reinterpret the nuclear dread of Kraftwerk’s ‘Radioactivity’, then ‘Trans Canada Highway’ connected with the open road optimism of ‘Trans Europe Express’, led by the summery ‘Davyan Cowboy’, where flanged guitars and earthy hip-hop beats promise to roll on forever until the sunrise.‘Skyliner’ pushes together Boards’ familiar elements into a mixture which is taut and propulsive, rather than introspective. The track’s synths swell in and out imparting a momentum that has more in common with house music than tripping hip-hop, while layers of rippling pitched percussion recall Talking Heads at their finest. ‘Heard From the Telephone Line’ is a classic pensive ambient cut from the duo, but feels shot through with a wide-eyed hope which on other records is either absent or subverted, while ‘Under The Coke Sign’ equally emphasises a sense of an expansive motorway landscape in all its wonder. It is the concise focus of the EP which further makes it a unique release within Boards of Canada’s output, creating a sense of endless travel not through mere depiction but by offering the listener sharp glimpses of distinct moments, untempered by the more sinister subject matter which dominates much of their work.