‘Agua de Jamaica’ (out 25th March) is the first collaborative project between producer, multi-instrumentalist, composer and arranger Sylvester Uzoma Onyejiaka II AKA Sly5thAve and pianist and composer Roberto Verástegui. The pair originally met whilst studying Jazz in Texas and began piecing together the ideas for the release on Sly5thAve’s first visit to Mexico, over a drink of Agua de Jamaica; “the ideas started popping and everything started flowing. All I could think about was the constant cultural and artistic exchange there is between Mexico and the US, even if the political division is very real”, Roberto muses. Recorded during lockdown in Mexico, the LP is built from a passionate and comprehensive understanding of Jazz, a love of Hip Hop and Mexico City’s ever-vibrant artistic culture, Latin flavours, and the African roots from which these sounds grew.

Continuing in the Jazz traditions, ‘Agua de Jamaica’ is littered with signature Sly5thAve interludes, weaved together like a symphony using album outtakes; “it’s my favourite thing about making a record – making a complete piece from start to finish”.