Peekay Mzee 'Phala' on Rise Music

A sunny, percussion-forward new single from Peekay Mzee lands on Rise Music this Friday, and it is a neat and rolling record. The drums run nearly the entire length of the track, a constant polyrhythmic presence that keeps everything moving at a relaxed, unhurried, knee-dip pace. The surface is busy, shakers, congas, and metallic clicks all find their place, but the mix is kept moderate in level and headroom, with the top end only moderately bright, so there is plenty of air for the melodies to breathe.

Hyenah picked it up in his Africa Is Forever Charts at the start of this week, placing 'Phala' at number eight in a chart in which three of the ten records come from his own Rise label. It follows his own release with beatsbyhand in late June, and Peekay Mzee's last outing on the label, a rework of Chelalow, back in mid-January, a six-month gap that now closes with a record that feels built for the kind of long, hot afternoons that define both Lisbon and Berlin in high summer.