Don Leisure is a producer based in Cardiff, Wales, perhaps best known as half of the hip hop/soul duo Darkhouse Family, alongside Earl Jeffers. In 2017, he released his debut solo album, Shaboo, a beat collage type of album in the tradition of Donuts. The title of the album came from Leisure’s uncle, the late Bollywood actor, Nasser “Shaboo” Bharwani. Five years later, Leisure is ready to return with a sequel project, Shaboo Strikes Back.

While the main roots of Shaboo were hip hop and the Asian radio jingles of Leisure’s youth, the sonic landscape of Shaboo Strikes Back takes that foundation and expands upon it. He’s taking his hip hop foundation and then folding in pieces of disco, funk, soul, Bollywood, psychedelic, jazz, dub, reggae, electro, and more as Leisure makes his way through the album. With the majority of the tracks under two minutes in length, Leisure is again taking this Donuts-esque approach to the album. All of these shorter instrumental compositions are interesting on their own, but when you put them together in the right sequence and listen to it all the way through, the total is greater than the sum of its parts. The key to making all of this work is the way in which Don Leisure is able to find all of these disparate musical elements and samples of vocals and whatnot, cut it all into small pieces, move everything around, and compose something entirely new that retains this laid back funky backbone. Leisure is also great with the transitions, such that you can get so lost in the music, you don’t necessarily notice all of the changing elements in the moment, until you’re like, “Wait, when this turn into a dub album?” “Wait, now it’s a psychedelic funk album?” “Wait, now it’s a Bollywood album?” The truth is, it’s all of those things, and more, because Leisure has found a way to blend them all and find the moments where all of these genres and subgenres talk to each other. When you add in the guest appearances of multi-instrumentalist Angel Bat Dawid and harpist Amanda Whiting on “All Praises Due,” and Super Furry Animal vocalist Gruff Rhys on “Neon Drizzle (Hotel Shaboo),” you have the two singles to take this album over the top.

Shaboo Strikes Back didn’t need to be as good as it is. Don Leisure could have just run the first album back, or just thrown some down tempo beats under some Bollywood samples and called it a day. Instead, he challenged himself and his listeners with something that is extremely creative and challenging, with a unique sound collage that reflects his own musical journey and pays tribute to his familial roots. As a result, we get one of the best instrumental albums of the year.