An increasingly visible representative of British jazz for international audiences, Shabaka Hutchings has never been afraid to voice his opinion on matters social and political. Signed to iconic US label Impulse! the saxophonist-clarinetist and leader of Sons Of Kemet delivers his most thought-provoking statement to date with Your Queen Is A Reptile. To call it an anti-monarchy polemic would be to slightly miss the point though, for Hutchings’ mission statement is to reflect on who, and for what reason, an individual may qualify for such a reverential status as queen, other than by accident of birth. The compositions are thus in honour of African, Caribbean, African-American and black British women who have distinguished themselves primarily as freedom fighters and campaigners for justice – Harriet Tubman, Nanny Of The Maroons and Doreen Lawrence, to name but some. That conceptual premise is matched by a musical creativity that builds on previous releases Burn and Lest We Forget, with the presence of new band members Theon Cross and Eddie Hick leading to pleasing shifts in the ensemble sound. Rhythmically SOK draws on a wide range of sources that reflect Hutchings’ deep interest in West Indian and African music as well as jazz, and it is precisely when the band hits upon a sound that falls somewhere in between recognised idioms that they excel. Hick’s intricate cowbell patterns, a strident soca mutation, are notable in this respect but the appearance of poet Josh Idehen on the Lawrence track also deserves a mention for the way his illuminating text places her struggle within a wider framework of social injustice. SOK may well go on to record albums with the same sense of musical and political purpose, but this feels like a highpoint of their output to date.