Album Review: Kokoroko's 'Tuff Times Never Last'
Their Sophomore Album Is As Cool As The Other Side Of The Pillow
Kokoroko’s sophomore album is cool. Cool as the other side of the pillow, cool like floating on top of the deep blue ocean, cool like the Fonz.
Kokoroko may be properly classified within the “Afrobeat” jazz subgenre which mixes West African rhythms with jazz harmony.
Its sound also includes a heavy dose of “highlife,” traditional Ghanian music that adopted instruments from colonial military bands. It was brought to America by jazz great Randy Weston in his eponymous 1963 album (below).
“Tuff Times Never Last” is introduced with trilling, electronic sounds leading into the smooth “Never Lost,” as if we dropped into a parallel dimension with Sade singing in the clubs of Accra. This leads into the album’s single “Sweetie” (below), a mid-tempo, polyrhythmic drink of water filled with horns and joy.
“Closer To Me” features a Fender Rhodes fading between left and right channels and a quavering synthesizer, followed by the charming vocal jazz of “My Father In Heaven.”
The middle of the album features three collaborations with LULU. (“Idea 5”), Azekel (“Three Piece Suit”), and, the most successful, “Time and Time” with Demae.
“Da Du Dah” brings funk rhythms and smooth horns as a soundtrack to a charming video (below) that finds the band meeting its younger selves on the playgrounds of London.
The album wraps up with “Together We Are,” ”Just Can’t Wait,” and “Over/Reprise,” featuring a repeated bass and guitar figure followed by a wind ensemble that gives way to a trippy synthesizer.
“Tuff Times Never Last’s” chill, blissed-out vibe is the analeptic soundtrack to my summer I didn’t know I needed.
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Cover image: album cover, “Tuff Times Never Last” (July 11, 2025, Brownswoods Recordings). Album cover art by Luci Pina. For more information about how she created the album cover image click here.