A killer entry in this excellent series – and a set that feels like you've stacked up a whole batch of deep funk 45s, but all packed together in one great album – with a price that's a lot lower than buying some of those too-expensive limited 7" singles! There's plenty of heavy drums, raw breaks, and soulful vocals throughout – and titles include "Wind Up" by Cookin On 3 Burners, "The Scoop" by the Oscillators, "Saved" by Glenn Fallows, "On The Hook" by Misha Panfilov, "Something Wonderful" by Mike Bandoni, "Auras" by Gentle Nature, "Enough" by Ray James, "A Better Woman" by Cole James, "Seek & Destroy" by Great Revivers, "It's Gonna Be Alright" by Carlton Jumel Smith, and "Fleet Streak" by Kerbside Collection. LP, Vinyl record album

Recent genius from the true king of Latin Soul – the mighty Joe Bataan, sounding every bit as great now as he did back in the day! Bataan gets some very hip backing from Los Fulanos – a Barcelona-based combo who help recreate the tight sound of Joe's early grooves from the late 60s, with just a touch of the funk he picked up in the 70s too – a really great blend that helps Bataan breath fresh new life into a range of classics from years back. The set list includes some of our favorite Latin Soul gems from Joe, and both the rhythms and production styles are completely faithful to the originals – but also aren't just simple copycat versions either. After so many years in obscurity, it's great to see Bataan back in action so strongly – cooking it hard and heavy on cuts that include "Latin Soul Square Dance", "Gypsy Woman", "Mestizo", "The Bottle", "Johnny's No Good", "Special Girl", "Subway Joe", "Puerto Rico Me Llama", and "Rap O Clap O 2008". (Latin, Deep Funk) CD

Really fantastic sounds from Butcher Brown – a group who just seem to leap forward more and more with each new release – and who've really hit their groove with this well-recorded performance! The album was recorded live to disc in London – with a superb sound that only further emphasizes the sharp instrumentation that make these guys way more than just another funky combo – the fluid blend of heavy drums, warm keyboards, rich bass, and great interplay between guitar, trumpet, and occasional tenor – handled with the dexterity of a 70s jazz funk supergroup, but with all the lean energy of a funky 45! The tunes are all originals, all nice and long, and wonderfully soulful – and titles include "918", "Camden Square", "Street Pharmacy", and "Fiat". CD

Slammin Hammond from Trio Valore – a really old school combo with a sweet mix of mod and funky rhythms! The group features heavy drums from Steve White – with a groove that stretches back to his many years on the hip side of the UK scene – and remaining trio members include Damon Minchella on guitar and Seamus Beaghen on Hammond – both players who more than keep up with White's hard-hitting approach, and really make the set cook up strongly throughout! A number of cuts are covers, but there's also some great originals too – and the whole thing has the feel of a hip 60s set in a small Soho club – but filtered through a generation that also understands funk as well. Titles include "Rehab", "Hola Muneca", "Fuoco", "Hip Hug Her", "Anxious Mo Fo", "All About My Girl", "Return Of The Iron Monkey", "Dam Square", and "Miracolo". LP, Vinyl record album

A fantastic combination of funky grooves – the studio talents of Adrian Younge & Ali Shaheed Muhammad, and the Brazilian-tinged fusion of the legendary Azymuth! The jazzy trio are in great form here – tunes that are lean, and which really offer up all the best aspects that the group brought to their music back in the late 70s and early 80s – spun with a slightly different format by the lineup of Alex Malheiros on bass, Ivan Mamao Conti on drums, and Linklon Kiko Contentino on Fender Rhodes and keyboards – but handled perfectly by Adrian and Ali in the studio – with just the right sort of sound to avoid some of the slicker production that the group had on some of their other American recordings from years back. All tunes are new originals – and titles include "Pulando Corda", "Friendship Samba", "Apocolyptico", "Cat Jump", "Fall Afternoon", "Ao Redor Do Samba", and "Sumare". CD

A great new showcase for the legendary keyboard work of Doug Carn – and a set that's very different both from his famous albums for the Black Jazz label, and some of his organ jazz records in more recent years too! The set's maybe got a more pronounced influence from Adrian Younge and Ali Shaheed Muhammad than some of the others in this series – as Carn's Hammond B3 and Fender Rhodes still get center stage, but the grooves are very much in the heavy funk style of Younge's legacy of recent recordings – sharp drums, strong basslines, and horns that are sometimes jazzy, sometimes seemingly touched by currents of Ethiopian work from the past. All tracks are originals, and titles include "Processions", "Dimensions", "Windfall", "Down Deep", "Freedom At Sunset", "Nunca Um Malandro", and "Lion's Walk". LP, Vinyl record album

Abstract Orchestra have already given us two great albums worth of funk remakes of cuts originally created by the Madvillain team of MF Doom and Madlib – and here, Rob Mitchell of the orchestra follows into the production talents of the latter, by serving up remixes of cuts from the previous two album projects! Rob's style is different than that used by Madlib – maybe more hip hop into club, but in a way that still lives up to all the great spirit of the Abstract Orchestra originals – as he serves up Ghost Life remixes of "Curls", "Bistro", "Eye", "Fancy Clown", "Accordion", "Fire In The Hole", "Borrowed Time", and "Fluid". LP, Vinyl record album