Their personal backgrounds may stretch from Brooklyn, NY to Austin, TX, but their musical explorations take them wider, from Africa to Latin America, with a continuum of soul, jazz, and funk as their fuel. The duo Ocote Soul Sounds, a.k.a. Antibalas’s Martin Perna, and Adrian Quesada of Austin’s Brownout have crafted a second album titled The Alchemist Manifesto slated for release June 10 on ESL Music.

Perna and Quesada previously contributed on the 2005 album El Niño Y El Sol (ESL). The new album has been described as a “deeper journey into their trademark tropical psychedelic sound.”

Both Perna, a staple Antibalas and Dap Kings member, and Quesada, who also plays in Austin Brownout and Grupo Fantasma, have a deep love for Afrobeat, Latin sounds, and American funk. Songs like “La Reja” denounce both the U.S./Mexican border fence and the Israeli separation wall in no uncertain terms, while cumbia comes alive on “Pescador.” Political themes are nothing new to these musicians, who’ve explored similar social dichotomies in their other bands. Perna has also promoted environmental justice via his veg-oil powered vehicles.

For, the new recording, however, expect Afro-jazz to blend and bump up with Latin and Caribbean influences on an eleven-song album that we here at XLR8R.com think sounds like a percussive, propulsive mix.

The Alchemist Manifesto after all casts its spell on June 10.