Nattali Rize & Notis - New Era Frequency EP (Baco Records)

This 9 track EP, for which the singer joined forces with Jamaican producer duo Notis (Wayne 'Unga' Thompson and Jason 'BigBass' Welsh), to serve as a preview for a full album which should follow later this year. Some ('Heart Of A Lion', 'New Reality') of Notis' productions sound a tad bombastic and reminded yours truly of Damian Marley's stage shows, something which, given that Nattali still toured with Junior Gong for a while, isn't even that surprising. The best tracks on 'New Era Frequency' are without the slightest doubt the ones for which Nattali invited a guest into the studio: there's opener 'Generations Will Rize', propelled to a whole other level by Kabaka Pyramid, and the almost just as infectious sounding 'Rebel Love', a duet with Zuggu Dan (guitarist with Protoje's Indiggnation). The EP concludes with three excellent dub versions, which charmed us even more than the rest of the tracks on 'New Era Frequency'.