Sélébéyone can justifiably lay claim to being one of the world's most original combinations of improvised music, hip-hop, spoken word and electronica. While drawing on the central tenets of all the aforesaid genres the five-piece has nonetheless brought a dynamic and subversive freshness to its material, which is given an astutely imaginative balance by the very make-up of the ensemble. There are two dual forces at play over one single foundation. The contrast between Steve Lehman’s alto saxophone and Maciek Lasserre’s soprano is loosely paralleled by the contrast between Senegalese MC Gaston Bandimic’s Wolof vocal and New Yorker HPrizm’s English. These are brilliant audio tag teams, two sets of links in one cohesive chain. The shifts in tone and phrasing, particularly the transition from the choppy, guttural West African rhythm to the smoother American flow almost makes for a four-horn front line over a one-man percussion orchestra. Furthermore, the inventively glacial effects that whirl around the rhythmic core of each piece enhance the enticingly fragmentary character of the music, but there are also intriguing juxtapositions of tempo, so that some tunes feel simultaneously slow and fast.

Standing both inside and outside recognised traditions Sélébéyone draws new meanings and resonances from its uniquely rich composite of African, American and African-American cultures.