• Music

    Nagat – Eyoun El Alb

    Our favorite reissue label, Wewantsounds, offers yet another gem to one of the coolest catalogs around.  This album comes from Egyptian diva Nagat, and it’s an example of a type of disco homegrown in Egypt – Disco Arabesquo – which combines the erstwhile dancing style of the 1970s with Arabic beats.  Insanely good.

  • Music

    Abdel Halim Hafez – Mawood

    Though it is always with great sadness that modern record labels who release spectacular vinyl editions don’t offer such releases on digital formats for sale, it’s a forgivable sin, as our dear friends at WeWantSounds continue to impress with their choices of artists they so lovingly reissue. Abdel Halim Hafez is at the peak of his powers at this point of his career, and Mawood is a shining example of the quality of Egyptian music during the early 1970s.   The good folks at WeWantSounds explain further at their Bandcamp site: “Famously sampled by Jay-Z on “Big Pimpin'” for one of…

  • Music

    Maha – Orkos

    The legendary Habibi Funk will be releasing another scorching release on October 10, 2022.  The release will feature a singer called Maha, who hails from Egypt and who worked with Salah Ragab’s Cairo Jazz Band as their main vocalist.  There is an amazing backstory you can find on the release’s Bandcamp site, but the most important paragraphs can be read below: Some years ago, we had released “Al Massrieen,” music which is the passion project of their composer, Hany Shenoda. Most of the music of this band was released by the Sout El Hob label and after our reissue they…

  • Music

    Abadir – Mutate

    SVBKVLT is a label based in Shanghai, China who have an international outlook.  A perfect example is this band, the Egyptian artist Abadir, who works in the field of experimental electronic music and glitch.

  • Music

    Various Artists – Sharayet El Disco – Egyptian Disco & Boogie Cassette Tracks 1982-1992 – LP with 2p col Insert (Black Vinyl)

    Though I don’t think this banger will be available as a digital download (my friends at Wewantsounds will be happy to clarify this), Sharayet El Disco is going to be an indispensable part of your world disco collection!  From the label’s Bandcamp site: “Wewantsounds is delighted to release ‘Sharayet el Disco’ a selection of Egyptian 80s Disco and Boogie tracks curated by Egyptian DJ Disco Arabesquo from his vast collection of cassettes. Most tracks have never been released on any other format and are making their vinyl debut with this set. A journey through the funky sound of 80s Egypt,…

  • Music

    Msylma & Ismael – The Tenets of Forgetting (مذاهب النسيان)

    Saudi singer Msylma & Egypt’s Ismael are two musicians who come from the rich Middle Eastern electronic music scene.  Msylma’s rich, mournful and introspective voice gives depth and emotion to the electro music produced underneath.  I have to admit, though this isn’t the kind of music I normally listen to, it’s so appealing to my ears that I’ll have to see what else these fine folks have produced in the past. Infinite respect to Éditions Appærent for publishing this fine album.

  • Music

    Adjin Asllan, Tarik Bulut, The Garabed Brothers, et al. – In An Egyptian Garden

    From the legendary Canary Records Bandcamp site: From the 1910s through the 1950s, immigrants released 78rpm discs marketed to their own language / ethnic groups, and that practice survived for a century well into the era of the 33rpm, 45rpm, cassette, and CD era. But from the mid-50s though the mid-70s some Greek, Armenian, and Lebanese-Syrians capitalized on the bellydance fad by issuing their recordings to a broader American public. While many of those recordings drew straight from the repertoire of pre-existing bands, some of the resulting LPs represented ad hoc groupings of performers that were unique and, in retrospect,…

  • Music

    FRKTL – Prose Edda

    FRKTL is the nom de plume of British-Egyptian composer Sarah Badr, and her work straddles so many genres that it’s quite hard to describe accurately (a wonderful thing, as it means her work is incredibly fresh-sounding). There are, of course, long, drone-y elements to the music, but once you go into tracks 3 and 4 (Hverfa af himni heiðar stjörnur and Hart er með hölðum, respectively, you start hearing elements of techno (!), bleak synthetic choruses sounding like the angels reciting the liturgy over the bowels of Hades (or, in this case, Hel, in order to maintain a proper cosmology). …

  • Music

    Alif – Aynama​-​Rtama

    I trust you, my friends, had a lovely Gregorian-Calendar Boxing Day. I spent mine listening to a Lebanese experimental band called Alif. At least as the liner notes on their Bandcamp site explain, it looks to be a collaboration between Lebanese and Egyptian musicians, and features the talents of the following musicians: Khyam Allami (Oud) Tamer Abu Ghazaleh (Vocals/Buzuq) Bashar Farran (Bass) Maurice Louca (Keys/Electronics) Khaled Yassine (Drums/Percussion) The music is so rich and complex that I’m having a bit of trouble putting to words how to describe it, but the best crack I can give at the moment is…

  • Music

    Baligh Hamdi – Instrumental Modal Pop of 1970’s Egypt

    Sublime Frequencies never ceases to amaze me with the gems they dig up.  From their Bandcamp site: Sublime Frequencies finally unleashes it’s ESSENTIAL compilation from 1970’s Egypt. Modal instrumental tracks from Baligh Hamdi – one of the most important Arabic composers of the 20th Century (writing for legends Umm Kalthum, Abdel Halim Hafez, Sabah, Warda, and many others). Features his legendary group the “Diamond Orchestra” with Omar Khorshid on guitar, Magdi al-Husseini on organ, Samir Sourour on saxophone, and Faruq Salama on accordion. All of these musicians were discovered and recruited by Hamdi to interpret his vision of a modernized,…