#afrofunk

It begins with Amayo’s tribute to his grandmother, a black magic shaman woman in touch with supernatural energies. The song, “Black Magic Sister” stutters on skittering, bunching syncopation, threading wheedling keyboards and off-beat cowbells through a sinuous call and response. Amayo holds court, letting the spirit move him as he sings, swaying with the back-slanted rhythms of reggae-adjacent afrobeat as he rides the current.

“Lion Awakes” runs steamier and funkier, guitars insinuated into a smolder of percussion, the beat rambling on, purposeful but not too fast. It’s too hot to run. The lion is the main character in three out of five of these tracks, strutting militantly in the snare-shot “Happy Lion,” triumphing over all comers in the final “Ascending Lion.” The Lion, I should mention, is Amayo, and of course he’s the hero of his own story.

Amayo brings the kung-fu-fighting samurai motif out into the foreground in “Shadowless,” a track whose bristling horns and burbling organ smoke but never erupt in flames. The menace is implied, never thrust forward, as Amayo whispers “Shadowless” against a slithery cadence of funk.

Amayo surrounds himself with an able collection of afro funk musicians from Africa and Los Angeles and Brooklyn. The backing is tight, in the sense of everything landing where it should, but also loose, with a give in the joints that makes you want to move. You probably didn’t know you needed an Afro funk concept album about a mighty kung fu warrior, but you did. You can thank me later.