Manifest Destiny

Chico Mann's lo-fi drum machine screams Shuggie Otis, but his saucy slinky rhythms spell F to the E to the L to the A (or, at the very least, harken back to his day job with Antibalas). Groove workout Soul Freedom is like a late-night transmission from some mysterious African shortwave station, while Piensalo fronts a primitive bedroom-recording innocence not seen since Daniel Johnston tried to purge the devil from his own heart. The new album is titled Manifest Tone, Volume 1, and I'll be a broken man if there's not more volumes where that came from.