Jay Mitta - Kazi Kwanza (2026)

Arriving seven years after his debut 'Tatizo Pesa' helped crack open Tanzania's hyperactive underground scene at its heart in Dar Es Salaam, Jay Mitta's sophomore charts the evolution of a sound that's still going from strength to strength. In the time since he broke out from the legendary Sisso Studios in Mburahati, the birthplace of singeli, Mitta has been steering its breakneck beats and cellphone-friendly hooks into various unexpected spaces, working alongside Errorsmith and The Modern Institute, remixing Caterina Barbieri's iconic 'Fantas' and tearing holes in the Berghain soundsystem with DJ Diaki. And his latest material reflects this wider reach, stepping up the complexity of each component part and fusing his localized sound palette with elements absorbed from trap, trance, grime, drill and hard techno. And unlike its predecessor that featured teenage MC Dogo Janja on the mic, 'Kazi Kwanza' is fully instrumental to completely demonstrate Mitta's skill as a producer.

Mitta's forward motion is already evident on opener 'Sawa', when the swinging, ratcheting singeli beat patterns, balanced out initially with distorted, blaring leads, tangle with hardstyle-inspired kicks, following the synths into a disorienting vortex. On 'Ubongo Beat' meanwhile, he augments a chaotic cut 'n' paste roll of chirpy videogame stings, drum fills and DJ tags with gliding trance stabs that appear to float over the whirlwind of snaps and metallic ticks, while the tongue-in-cheek anthem 'Baba Fet' comes off like a dancehall-inflected, hi-NRG response to Motohiro Kawashima and Yuzo Koshiro's iconic 'Streets of Rage II' soundtrack, complete with grotty overdriven guitars and 16-bit bleeps. Even when he slows down the tempo, Mitta still retains the same manic energy; '44444' clocks in at a comparatively breezy 170pbm and sandwiches baroque organ stabs between trancey supersaws, marimba smacks and what might be amapiano's signature log drum.

Painting a picture of a contemporary Dar Es Salaam that's vibrant and buzzing with life, Mitta adds deeper, more nuanced shades this time around, showing a more melancholy side on the elegiac 'Mwanzo' and descending into disorder and dissonance on 'Koma No'. But he's most comfortable at the dance, whether he's mashing minimal techno's rolling bass with sizzling high end horns on 'Kensheshe Beat' or freewheeling all the way to the carnival on the album's brief, sugar sweet finale 'Funga Mtaa'.