Album of the Day: Xenia Rubinos’s Black Terry Cat - thoroughly exhilarating, hugely important

Xenia Rubinos comes to the game with a big bag of musical and lyrical smarts. The second album from the New York-based artist with the Puerto Rican and Cuban family backgrounds is a swell of sounds, a record where her sassy, colourful blend of jazz, hip-hop, soul, R&B and rock produces some mighty, infectious tracks.

The uptown and downtown soundclash running throughout provides the backdrop for a fully charged Rubinos taking on whatever the world throws at her. This means everything from a sharp, spiky, stark clamour about inequalities and injustices (Mexican Chef counting the number of Latinos working at restaurant jobs no one else will do) to the loss suffered when her father died (Black Stars) to the casual racism which many migrants face (See Them).

A thoroughly exhilarating and hugely important album very much in tune with these turbulent times.

[ xeniarubinos.com ]