Jazz Voice unfailingly supplies a gigantic sugar-rush of auditory pleasure, and this year’s edition was no exception. Arranged, scored and conducted by the brilliant Guy Barker, the evening’s opener saw rising US vocalist Judi Jackson and the EFG London Jazz Festival Orchestra transform Nirvana’s brooding “Come As You Are” into a swaggering, Vegas-style workout.

My friend, let’s call her Kit, is having a rubbish time. Kat (that’s me) is too. If life’s got a flavour, it’s a shade darker than 99% cocoa. Kit and Kat are bitter. But if life is akin to boxed chocolates (or even foil-wrapped), there’s an entire world of tastes out there. What better than to add some sweetness, stir in some sugar? That’s where Craig comes in. Oh, Craig! Who in the world could be more delicious than this honey-tongued, smooth-talking lady charmer?

Without further ado, slightly delayed by the sheer volume of releases at this year time of year, here is the latest edition of theartsdesk on Vinyl. You will not find a more extensive monthly report on the goodies newly available on plastic anywhere on the internet. Every conceivable genre is theartsdesk on Vinyl’s game so dive in and get involved!

VINYL OF THE MONTH

Dallas Acid The Spiral Arm (All Saints)

By the time Vampire Weekend reached Birmingham on their latest UK jaunt, they had unfortunately managed to mislay their support band, the colourful Songhoy Blues. This was a great shame, as the Malians would surely have added a bit of colour to the early part of an evening that would most certainly have benefitted from a bit of light and shade.

“It's Gonna Take a Miracle” just missed out on a mainstream US Top 40 placing after The Royalettes issued it as a single in June 1965. But the song had staying power. In 1971 Laura Nyro covered it, choosing it as the title track for the album she made with LaBelle. Deniece Williams’s version hit big in 1982.

Ólafur Arnalds is almost secretly huge. Millions adore the melancholy beauty of the Icelandic composer’s music, yet his name still brings blank stares from some.

With US number one singles and Grammys coming out of his ears, a record-breaking streak at the top for debut album This One’s For You and collaborations with country big-timers aplenty, Luke Combs is riding high.

The joy of Afro-Beat comes from the intricate play of polyrhythms, eloquently constructed around the subtle interplay of guitars, bass, backing vocals, percussion and horns: each voice follows a distinct path, and the combination of each in a rich and complex whole is both powerfully mind-blowing and irresistibly danceable.

A fiddle projects upwards from between Erlend Apneseth’s knees. Seated, he holds another in his right hand facing-off the instruments against each other. He’s plucking both, the pizzicato pitter-patter suggesting water drops on a bell or a koto. On the other side of the stage, guitarist Stephan Meidell is looping the sound, treating it to form a wash akin to that of a waterfall. In between, percussionist Øyvind Hegg-Lunde is behind a drum kit rattling and scraping what looks like a cheese grater attached to some allen keys.

BaBa ZuLa only fully manifest their free spirit when they play live, and in the intimate setting of a venue like the Jazz Cafe, where the entre audience is close to the stage.