Back catalogue: Funk

Review: Manu Dibango knew how to work a crowd. By the time he hit the stage at Marseille's Theatre La Criee in December 1982, he had long mastered the art of turning a gig into a full-blown celebration. This was the man who took makossa global, who made 'Soul Makossa' an international sensation a decade prior and who could pivot between jazz, funk and African rhythms like it was nothing. The recording, unearthed from the INA archives, captures him in peak form, leading an eight-piece band through a set that refuses to sit still. 'Africa Boogie' is all clipped guitars, tight horns and a bassline that struts like it owns the place. 'Ashiko Oumba' turns the groove alluringly, locking into intricate polyrhythms before erupting into pure brass-fuelled joy. Then there's 'Waka Juju', sprawling across three parts, moving from simmering tension to full-throttle release with the kind of control only Dibango could pull off. He's conducting, shaping the music in real-time, every solo a conversation, every break a setup for the next explosion of sound. Four decades later, the set still feels alive. It's there in the call-and-response with the crowd, the sweat-soaked momentum of a band that knows it's on fire. Dibango, effortlessly cool at the centre of it all, proves once again why his music never ages.

Review: The recent Tokyo Dreaming compilation on Wewantsounds was a huge success so the label does the right thing and follows it up with another collection of sounds from the Far East. This one again looks into the fascinatingly niche city pop sound with expert digger DJ Notoya at the wheels. He delves into the Nippon Columbia catalogue and turns out all manner of breezy and laidback gems from Hiroshi Sato, Hitomi "Penny" Tohyama, Midori Hara and more. In many cases, these tunes are making it tot vinyl for the first time. What's more, the audio has been newly remastered in Tokyo for this reissue making sure it sounds as good as possible.

Review: Adding to the fervour around Japanese city pop - the genre is still a clogged but speculative seep for reissuers, who are keen to capitalise on the mainly Tokyo-born genre's still underground, under-recognised reserves of music - comes DJ Nutoya with a fresh and terse ten-tracker compilation: Tokyo Bliss. This breezy selection centres on the all-rounder genre's favourite international foci, boogie and funk: frissonic formulas for sensational home listening. Most tracks here make their debut on vinyl outside of Japan; from Buzz's pristine tremolo'er 'Garasumado', to Keiko Toda's escape-noteworthy 'Fade In' and Yuji Mitsuya's delirious summer disco dirge 'After Five At Caf-Bar', this is an impeccable curation job.

Review: Following the success of their previous Tokyo Glow compilation, Wewantsounds once again team up with Japanese Tokyo-based DJ Notoya to dig up the rich Electric Bird catalogue, and come with a subsequent, versatile selection of sunny jazz-funk gems recorded between 1978 and 1987 for the label. A tasty selection featuring Yasuaki Shimizu, Toshiyuki Honda and Mikio Masuda, together with a few American musicians such as Ronnie Foster and Bobby Lyle, most tracks here are making their debut outside of Japan, the album comes with a full annotation by Notoya and is a multifarious meander through every angle of the polygonal gamut of J-jazz, disco, city pop, and funk. Highlights include Masuda's 'Let's Get Together' and Foster's prototypical wonky funk number, 'Night Life'.