Alto saxophonist and rapper Soweto Kinch ends his four-year hiatus from the studio this September with the release of bold new album entitled The New Emancipation. The album picks up on his unique blend of imaginative post-bop sounds, following on from his previous 2006 album A Life In The Day Of B19: Tales From The Towerblock, this time with a more expansive acoustic sound alongside tight hip-hop beats. This is coupled to some bitingly satirical lyrics focusing on such weighty themes as debt/wage slavery to creative oppression in the music industry and ideas of race in a post-Obama age.

Kinch pulls off this stylistic balancing act with a strong instrumental and melodic core within all the high-minded concepts, the molten set of influences according to Kinch including Duke Ellington, Madlib and Frederick Delius, it attempts to “plant the power and significance of the blues firmly with modern realities.” It is also helped along by a talent-heavy group of musicians that include Byron Wallen, Justin Brown, Eska Mtungwazi, Femi Temowo, Shabaka Hutchings and Harry Brown among others.  

Sounding as confident as ever Kinch says the project sets out to: “challenge the comfort and complacency of our modern world, when the same conditions that enslaved and immiserated people 150 years ago are still powerfully in effect today. Yet above all it's about celebrating the endurance and resilience of the human spirit.”

- Mike Flynn

For more go to www.soweto-kinch.com

Soweto Kinch plays the London Jazz Festival on Thursday 18 November.