JIMI TENOR Schallplatten & CDs

Review: On paper, this may seem an unlikely collaboration - Japanese ambient and deep acid stalwart meets eccentric Finnish lounge, jazz and exotica veteran - but it's a genuinely brilliant EP. 'Big City Takes' genuinely makes the best of both Calm and Jimi Tenor's talents, with the latter's eyes-closed vocals, evocative flutes and shuffling exotica rhythms fitting perfectly with the former's stirring strings and immersive ambient electronics. Tapes remixes, first delivering a jazzy hip-hop informed head-nodder before serving up some ambient dub/digi-dub fusion, before Calm delivers his version of a second Tenor collaboration, 'Time and Space' - an ambient jazz masterpiece. Vendetta Suite's warming, subtly tropical Balearic rework of that track is also brilliant. Tip!

Review: Hamburg-based label Bureau B welcome back Jimi Tenor for what is his third full length with them. The Finnish artist has played all over the world playing minimalist soundscapes while mostly releasing jazz and Afrobeat records over the past two decades. All of this new one was recorded in his Helsinki home studio with a real DIY spirit and a synthesizer, flute and saxophone. The simple set up has led to astoundingly good results with versatile grooves and plenty of good ties.

Review: In recent years we've become accustomed to Jimi Tenor flitting between off-kilter jazz, Afro-soul and - most recently via a Freestyleman collaboration - oddball house. 'Mysteria', his latest single, recalls the easy-going vocal numbers that marked out his years on Warp Records in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Not quite lounge, synth-pop, deep boogie or jazz-funk but rather something in between, the song features a typical lead vocal from Finland's greatest export bar Teemu Pukki, some seriously squelchy bass, and plenty of retro-futurist charm. Arguably even better is 'Vocalize My Love', a kind of jumpy Afro-dancehall number featuring analogue bass, hot-stepping drums and superb vocals courtesy of Florence Addoni and Lizzy Amaliyenga.

Review: Finnish vibe artisan Jimi Tenor returns to Max Weissenfeldt's Philophon with two more contemporary dreamboat affairs... "Quantum Connection" springs with a bruk-like energy but chats in fluent jazz via the eastern horns and spiralling hook narrative. "My Mind Will Travel" maintains the spring but with much more of a loungey feel and a molten vocal that flops over the tightly plucked strings with humour and syrupy ease. One of a kind.