Kaidi Tatham - The Only Way (LP) 2023 (Mint (M))

Kaidi Tatham’s fifth album for First Word moves through bruk, funk, jazz, mid-tempo hip-hop and Brazilian rhythm without settling anywhere for long, each shift still carrying what the label calls his ‘unmistakable sonic signature.’ The title track features MC Uhmeer — son of DJ Jazzy Jeff — marking hip-hop’s fiftieth anniversary, while the closer brings in Trian Kayhatu and Matt Lord. As one of broken beat’s original architects, Tatham treats genre-hopping less as a gimmick than as simply how he’s always worked, eleven tracks that sit somewhere between jazz’s harmonic depth and dance music’s physicality.