TONY ALLEN Schallplatten & CDs

Review: Even after his death, Tony Allen is still delivering ground-breaking and genre-bending releases. There is No End, a posthumous album largely recorded in 2019 but finished (with Allen's blessing) following his death by co-producers Vincent Taeger and Vincent Taurelle, veers away from the Nigerian drummer's Afro-beat, Afro-jazz and Afro-disco roots, instead combing his brilliant polyrhythms with elements of grime, dubstep, hip-hop, soul and funk, plus vocals from a veritable who's who of MCs, spoken word artists and singers. The results are hugely impressive and forward-thinking, offering a fittingly on-point post-script to Allen's exceptional career.

Review: Tony Allen is on record as saying that The Source, his first album on iconic jazz label Blue Note, is the best recording he's made. Given his length of service and vast discography, that's a bold claim. Certainly, it's a fine album, with the legendary drummer and his selected musicians - mostly jazz players from Paris, plus a Cameroonian guitarist and previous Allen collaborator Damon Albarn on one cut - effortlessly blur the boundaries between Afrobeat and the kind of jazz pioneered by Allen's percussion heroes Art Blakey and Max Roach. It's a brilliant hybrid that fits Allen's unique style of drumming like a glove, and there's no doubt that the former Fela Kuti sticks-man is the real star of the show.

Review: How often does a superstar band leader hand his band over to his drummer, while he steps back to become a sideman? That's what Fela Kuti, undoubtedly the coolest, hippest, best known African musician on the planet, did in 1975. "Afro Disco Beat" is the complete seventies anthology of the drummer and music director of superstar Fela Kuti's band Africa 70, the creators of a new style called 'Afrobeat', one of the (if not THE) hippest rhythmic music styles of the seventies. Tony Allen was an incredible drummer of whom Fela Kuti said "he sounds like four drummers".

Review: Arriving sometime after the passing of legendary Afrobeat drummer Tony Allen, and utilising some of the final recordings he made during his lifetime, the latest edition of Adrian Younge's Jazz Is Dead series is naturally tinged with melancholy. Yet Younge refuses to succumb to emotion, and instead uses Allen's impeccable grooves and polyrhythmic patterns as the basis of tracks that blend jazz, Afrobeat, Afro-funk and soul. There's a classic Fela Kuti feel to opener 'Ebun', where sax lines reminiscent of the Nigerian musical icon rise above a typically crunchy Allen groove, pots and pans percussion and ear-catching bass, while the flute-sporting 'Don't Believe The Dancers' adds a little more jazziness into its righteous blend of heavy Afrobeat horns, meandering solos and loose-limbed grooves. In other words, it's a spot-on tribute to a genuine musical legend.

Review: Two titans of African music come together for a collaboration that will sadly never be repeated after the passing of the late Hugh Masekela. Allen's instantly recognisable drumming and Masekela's iconic trumpet are a match made in heaven - after all their paths first crossed back in the 70s thanks to Fela Kuti's galvanizing energy. Forget the throwback stuff trying to capture the spirit of the originators, this IS the originators sounding cool and deadly in every way. Funk lovers, Afrobeat heads, curious ears and dancing souls take heed - this right here is an unmissable transmission from two grandmasters in their field.

Review: Finnish lounge lizard-turned-jazzman Jimi Tenor first joined forces with legendary Afrobeat drummer Tony Allen for a joint album on Strut in 2009. In January 2016, they reunited for two nights of performance at Cafe Oto in London, making use of a range of prototype and experimental analogue synthesizers loaned by the Moog Sound Lab. It must have been a terrific couple of days, because the live recordings showcased here are superb. As you'd expect, Allen's distinctive drumming provides the backbone, while Tenor variously delivers mazy Moog synth solos, trippy electronics, bittersweet lounge vocals (reminiscent of his late '90s albums on Warp) and occasional flute and sax solos. The results are decidedly intergalactic and out-there: wayward Afro-jazz for analogue astronauts.