Yussef Kamaal

Two musicians, one record

Yussef Kamaal were drummer Yussef Dayes and keyboardist Kamaal Williams, who is credited on the album as Henry Wu. Williams, born Henry Williams on December 14, 1989, had made house and broken beat as Henry Wu from 2011; Dayes, born December 12, 1992, had co-founded United Vibrations (2009 to 2016) with his brothers Ahmad and Kareem and the saxophonist Wayne Francis II. Sources differ on when they met, 2007 or 2008. The Ransom Note and Twisted Soul trace the band to a Boiler Room session meant as a one-off, in which Williams invited Dayes to play Henry Wu's music, and Williams has said the pair toured for about two years backing Katy B before the record.

In 2016 a twenty-minute set at Gilles Peterson's Worldwide Awards led to a deal with Peterson's Brownswood Recordings, and Black Focus came out on November 4, 2016. It was the duo's only studio album. They won Breakthrough Act at the Jazz FM Awards in early 2017, and a planned appearance at SXSW that March did not happen. On May 4, 2017, a week after the award, Brownswood announced that Dayes and Williams would no longer perform together as Yussef Kamaal; that night's show at KOKO in London went ahead billed as the Kamaal Williams Ensemble presents Black Focus. No source we found gives a reason for the split.

Afterward Williams released The Return (2018), regarded as a sequel to Black Focus, then Wu Hen (2020) and Stings (2023) on his Black Focus Records. Dayes made What Kinda Music (2020, Blue Note) with Tom Misch, which reached 4 in the UK, and the solo Black Classical Music (September 8, 2023), which won the 2024 Ivor Novello for best album.