Cassette City

'Cassette City', the appropriately titled second album from Philadelphia-based sonic auteur Lushlife, has not only breathed new life into hip-hop, returning it to its former glories after a prolonged period of stasis and creative indulgence, but has also harnessed hip-hop's original spirit of wanderlust and connected it to a futuristic vision of what it could, should and would be.

This ambitious long-player bristles with intent. It's short, sharp, and superbly to the point - there's no meandering across 20 mind-numbing tracks here. The beats are crisp and taut - exactly what you'd expect from someone who has devoured classic '90s hip-hop - while the stunning arrangements echo the work of Raj's other great influences: the otherworldly production of guys like Brian Wilson, Van Dyke Parks, and David Axelrod. Indeed, as befits someone who first shot to fame with West Sounds, an unforgettable melding of Kanye West's The College Dropout and The Beach Boys' Pet Sounds.

Guests do appear - Ariel Pink, Camp Lo and Greg Saunier of Deerhoof - but these are in place to add colour, not dilute the affair. In short, Cassette City, from the opening track Innocence (Pete Rock meets the baroque chamber-pop of Spirit) and the incendiary soulful strut of the first single Another Word for Paradise, to the jump-up party sounds of In Soft Focus by way of the untainted melodicism of The Songbird Athletic, is nothing short of a minor triumph.