Lioness Fonts - From A Baobab Tree (1 Roar Records/VPal)

Lioness Fonts' 'From A Baobab Tree' already dates back to 2015, but we were so taken with this album that we didn't want to withhold it from you. Fonts hails from Dominica, a Caribbean island where earlier this year large landslides caused by Hurricane Maria damaged 90% of the houses, but age six moved to Luton in the UK. These days Lioness Fonts resides in London, where she often collaborates with Jah Youth Sound. For 'From A Baobab Tree' the singer joined forces with reggae veteran Nereus Joseph: "It has been a fantastic experience! Working with an artist that knows what they want is a pleasure!". On the album the Dominican lioness proves herself to be a very versatile singer, able to handle anything from the delicious lovers rock of 'I And I' and the soulful 'Camel Caravan Man' to more militant roots songs like 'They Never Loved' or title track 'From a Baobab Tree', a tribute to her African ancestors. 'From A Baobab Tree' certainly doesn't lack recognizability, as in addition to reinterpretations of classics like Burning Spear's 'Old Marcus Garvey' ('They Never Loved', in which Fonts not only honors Marcus Garvey, but also salutes other heroes from the black emancipation struggle, like Harriet Tubman, Rosa Parks, Malcolm X, Nat Turner or Fred Hampton) or Tyrone Taylor's 'Cottage In Negril' ('From A Dungeon', in which the singer refers to Elmina, the most notorious slave fort in Ghana, ran by the Dutch for more than two centuries, who from there exported an average of 2000 slaves a year to the Americas), the track list also contains a successful cover of Desmond Dekker's 'Israelites', and for a number of other songs, riddims from well-known classics were recycled: for 'Brother Man' Lioness Fonts used Peter Tosh's 'Stepping Razor', for 'You Never Hail' she revisited the Ba Ba Boom riddim, 'In These Times' is a version over Dennis Brown's 'Revolution', and for 'Aces International', a tribute to the Jamaican sound system that introduced the world to legends like Yellowman, Fathead, Beenie Man and Billy Boyo, Fonts revived Gregory Isaacs' 'Storm'. On 'From A Baobab Tree' Lioness Fonts holds her own from the first to the last song, and has found a new fan in yours truly!