Listen to this week’s playlist on YouTube and Spotify.

To record “Culcha Vulcha,” their 11th album and first true studio disc in eight years, Snarky Puppy decamped to a pecan orchard at the remote Sonic Ranch Studios in Tornillo, Texas, a five-minute walk from the Mexican border. The Texas-bred/Brooklyn-based collective used a week in isolation to record nine original tracks that showcase a darker hued sound. Influenced by the travels of their nearly constant world tours, which have seen the band play over 1200 shows on six continents, sounds from places like Mumbai, Rio de Janeiro and Buenos Aires effortlessly mingle with strains of Motown, vintage J.B.’s and the music of Dallas, Texas churches that were so crucial to Snarky Puppy’s formative years.

Since the turn of the century, saxophonist and composer Marcus Strickland has made indelible imprints on the modern jazz scene, playing with such titans as Roy Haynes, Dave Douglas and Jeff ‘Tain’ Watts and reinvigorating the genre with his own band, Twi-Life. The latest incarnation of that band is featured on Strickland’s debut for Blue Note Records, “Nihil Novi.” Along with producer Meshell Ndegeocello, he draws upon a world of music from J Dilla’s hip-hop beat making to Bartok’s Hungarian folk music, from Fela’s propulsive Afrobeat to Mingus’ freewheeling jazz truths. The group features, among others, pianist Robert Glasper, trumpeter Kenyon Harrold and drummers Chris Dave and Charles Haynes.

Also this week, Japanese pianist/composer Hiromi showcases the always thrilling sound of her Trio Project for her tenth CD as a leader, “Spark”.

New Jersey native Freddie Hendrix gathers up former or current Jersey residents saxophonists Bruce Williams and Abraham Burton, pianist Brandon McCune, trombonist David Gibson and drummer Cecil Brooks III for the trumpeter’s new recording, “Jersey Cat”; and saxophonist Tom Tallitsch features an exciting program of original compositions and new arrangements of a few classics for his fourth release for Posi-Tone records, “Gratitude.”