Zoë Mc Pherson feat. Jay Mitta - 3OK (2026)

Bashed out in Kampala and then ruthlessly sculpted and edited in the years that followed, this tuff-as-nails EP arrives on SVBKVLT courtesy of SFX figurehead Zoë Mc Pherson, Singeli explorer Jay Mitta and Bamako's Balani OG DJ Diaki. Vital listening for the rhythm fetishists, no doubt.

Back in 2022, Mc Pherson headed to Kampala for an Afropollination residency at Nyege Nyege studios, where they teamed up with Mitta and Diaki for the first time. Despite not sharing a language, the trio quickly figured out how to articulate themselves: if the music was hitting they'd all shout "OK". '3OK' emerges from these initial sessions, that Mc Pherson has "reworked, extended and polished" in the four years since, transforming the energetic, freeform sketches into proper dancefloor belters. And if you're familiar with the three artist's solo gear, it won't be surprising to hear that the tempo's brisk from the offset. After Diaki appears momentarily to introduce the record, '222' breaks the ribbon in earnest with Mc Pherson's lightning-fast 220bpm breaks and Mitta's technicolor synth sequences, that click together like Lego bricks.

It's singeli re-engineered to fit the needs of a fully-equipped soundsystem, if you like. Tune into 'Singeli on TV' and you'll get the message; Mitta's familiar looping patterns lead the charge, but Mc Pherson guides the material towards different territory with their abrupt start-stop processes, noisy interjections and psychotropic effects. That vibe carries through to 'Stubnitz', the EP's most generous track and the one that owes the most to Tanzania's best musical export. Here, we get to witness the vibrating 200bpm rhythms mutate in real time, picking up the dust and dirt slowly and surely until they're nowt but ratcheting overdriven kicks and neuro womps in the final stretch. Everything builds to Diaki's triumphant return on 'Orchestra', when Mc Pherson assembles a suitably epic bed of strings, voices and synths to play out their ambitious blur of free rhythms, wiggly leads and filtered oscillations.