Gnarls Barkley are vocalist Cee-Lo from Goodie Mob and super-producer Danger Mouse (Gorillaz, Danger Doom, The Grey Album, Danger Mouse and Jemini) and, simply put, they are going to be the biggest thing of the summer by far. In Britain, “Crazy” has already shot to number one on the charts based purely on the strength of downloads (a first!) and Gnarls is ready to launch their experimental psych-soul machine on the world. This song is a perfect example of the effectiveness of their synthesis of soul, psychedelia, hip-hop production and pure experimentation. Cee-Lo’s voice soars and Danger Mouse’s understated yet layered production – a style that he’s been working on ever since his underground rap smash album Ghetto Pop Life works perfectly. The combination of Cee-Lo’s voice and DM’s production here sounds vaguely reminiscent of the “trip-hop” of Massive Attack or Tricky, but updated for the 21st century.

In the past few years, Bend Sinister has gone from a bunch of kids from Kelowna who played a lesser form of math rock into one of the most interesting bands in Vancouver. Their first album was almost universally praised and they toured in support of it all the way to New York City. Unfortunately, they are still in the process of recording a follow up – lead guitarist Naben Ruthnum tells me that so far that it’s killer – but here is this live session recorded for CBC Radio 3 to tide their listeners over. Refreshingly, Bend Sinister wear their influences – Queen, Supertramp, prog rock and metal in general – on their sleeves unironically.

In the last few years, conventional wisdom has had it that underground hip-hop’s ability to make purely enjoyable songs (club bangers) has been eclipsed by the mainstream. And I must confess that this insight is ostensibly true. But here comes Roc C– out of the ridiculously talented Oxnard, California crew that includes Madlib, Dudley Perkins, MED, et al. – to dispel that notion with the Oh No produced “El Capitan” which bounces along with all the neck-snapping potential of the latest Lil Jon or Rick Rock creation. Along for the fun is the highly regarded Chino XL who drops a typically hot verse.

If someone crossed Prince with Kraftwerk, Hot Chip would probably be the result. In the studio, they tend to lean on the Kraftwerk influence and the results are, in my opinion, sometimes lacking. But, live, Hot Chip emphasize their debts to Prince and it is in this setting that they really start to sound like something special. Recorded live in Toronto, “Down With Prince,” as the title suggests, takes their appreciation and recapitulation of Prince even further; near the end of the track, when the band emerges from an extended synthesizer breakdown, I could swear that the purple robed, basketball loving funk legend was on stage.

Recorded shortly before J Dilla’s 's death, Black Thought and Dice Raw (from the Legendary Roots Crew) put together this mixtape track, using a J Dilla instrumental from Dilla’s instant classic record Donuts. Black Thought’s verse is inspired, mixing together his usual “I’m the best” material with a Fab Five Freddy shout-out and a couple different flows. In the end, the strength of this song is based on the flexibility of J Dilla’s instrumental, which works as well here as it did without vocals on Donuts.