Kutiman - 6am

The Guardian 80

(Siyal)

Ophir Kutiel is an Israeli multi-instrumentalist who has spent chunks of the past decade digging around on YouTube for amateur recordings and splicing them into audio-visual harmony for a series called ThruYou. Before the first instalment, which went viral in 2009, he released an accomplished debut album, heavy on funk, psych-rock and Afrobeat, with dashes of reggae and jazz. Roughly the same ingredients go into his long-awaited follow-up, but 6am feels better integrated and grander in scope. The eastern ululations on She’s a Revolution, the spaghetti western guitar on Shine Again, the sweeping strings on Dangerous combine to cinematic effect, evoking a scuzzy desert epic where peril and intrigue are offset by the sheer exuberance and warmth of Kutiel’s playing.