2023 has seen a slightly higher quantity of New Soul and Funk albums and some real quality albums. Jalen Ndonga, Acantha Lang and Incognito are all great albums and worthy of being top of the list. Jalen has made a great retro Soul album with shades of Marvin and early 70's Motown, Acantha a beautiful Southern Soul album in the style of Shirley Brown/Betty Wright and Incognito their best in at least a decade and all of them are UK based. Paulette McWilliams , Output Input, Natasha Watts and Will Downing also had strong albums, and The Sextones with another...
There were some really good New Jazz albums in 2023. Yussef Dayes made a really interesting debut solo album , Australian band Menagerie an excellent album and UK band Ezra Collective a superb album that won a Mercury prize. Camilla George, Matthew Halsall, Tenderlonious and Scottish Band Mama Terra and Malcolm Strachan also had good UK based albums.Nicole Conte had his best in a while and fellow Italian artist Gerardo Frisina another good album. Billy Valentine and Carmen Lundy kept the US vocal Jazz flag flying with good albums, the Ethnic Heritage Ensemble had a tribute to Don Cherry. Ed Motta had his...
