<p><span><span>- Horatio Luna (aka <strong>Henry Hicks</strong>) has just put out his latest release titled <em>Boom Boom</em>. An ever-on-the-hustle musician, he is a founding member of <strong>30/70</strong> and member of <strong>On-Ly</strong> (and probably some projects I’m not even aware of!). Hicks has brought together some great instrumentalists and compositions on <em>Boom Boom</em>, creating something touching on different styles such as disco, house, hip-hip and jazz, but always, deliciously groove-based.</span></span></p>
<p><span><span>The titular track kicks things off with shuffling drums and an elastic bassline (note the nice bass harmonics). This is followed by <em>Fuck The System</em> (featuring <strong>Willy Dynamo</strong> & <strong>Thamson P</strong>), a funky hip-hop track where cooking up jazz bangers is mentioned (they definitely cooked some up IMO).</span></span></p>
<p><span><span>A personal fav is <em>Patrice</em>, with its groove approaching <strong>Patrice Rushen</strong> levels of smoothness – it's got a beautiful electric chord progress, thumping drums and a rolling bass line (love the high fret-runs when the track buillds). Diva vox come in, I lose it; goosebumps for days. </span></span></p>
<p><span><span><em>No Words,</em> <em>Big Party</em> is similar to Patrice, going in a more house direction with its heavy kick and tight bass riff. The wordless vocals move around while filters are swept. The percussion really comes to the fore with come great auxiliary rhythms as synths cascade around you. Bumps starts off with syncopated drums and more sweet chords. The bass is dexterous as ever, bouncing around until a disco-laden groove is settled into. <em>Bush Doof</em> is a wild track, with a pummelling bassline and sirens a-la trance in the great outdoors. It departs from this but never loses the intensity – setting up shop somewhere suitable psychedelic. Again, some amazing solos from the piano and bass. Just in case your heart-muscle is a bit worn out from all the action, we get a nice easy runway to return to the terminal with <em>Peruvian</em> (featuring <strong>Jitwam</strong>) slowing the mood right down: a syrupy, soulful slow jam.</span></span></p>
<p><span><span><em>Boom Boom</em> is another superb release from Luna and great follow up to <em>Yes Doctor</em> and the excellent <em>Print It, Run It, Send It</em> EP. As ever, though there’s a real jazz flavour to the tracks, with much of it sounding improvised, with touches of <strong>Thundercat</strong>, <strong>Moodyman</strong>, <strong>Theo Parrish</strong>, et al., Luna has made it his cause to show how vibrantly modern, border crossing and just moreish you can be. </span></span></p>
<p><span><span>- Hillfolk.</span></span></p>
<iframe style="border: 0; width: 100%; height: 120px;" src="https://bandcamp.com/EmbeddedPlayer/album=2459286701/size=large/bgcol=f…; seamless><a href="https://horatioluna.bandcamp.com/album/boom-boom">Boom Boom by Horatio Luna</a></iframe>