What a wild and heavy album out of Haiti! From Chouk Bwa’s Bandcamp site: “Following on from the first edition released earlier this year, we’re please to announce ‘Ayiti Kongo Dub EP#2‘ by Chouk Bwa & The Ångströmers. As Afro-Caribbean polyrhythms meet bass-weight dub electronics, the two part EP has documented the group experimenting with …
Read more “Chouk Bwa & The Ångstromers – Ayiti Kongo Dub #2”
The Sound Of Shellac is a record label out of Norway which refurbishes old 78rpm discs, brightens their sound and releases these tracks into well-curated compilations. What’s more, they’re offered as pay-as-you-like releases, so purchasing these comps helps show support for such a fine label. This particular disc features artists John McCormack, Paul Robeson and …
Canary Records produces another excellent collection of archival music, this time from Serbia. From his Bandcamp site: “The Banat Tamburitza band are said to have been formed around 1912 or ’13 in Elizabeth, New Jersey by Serbian immigrants from the village of Sânpetru Mare (then-population about 2,000) in the Banat region of present-day Timiș county …
Read more “Banat Tamburitza Orchestra – Serbian Dance Band in New Jersey, ca. 1949-50”
Yggdrasil are a Faroese project led by multi-instrumentalist Kristian Blak (whom I had the pleasure, many years ago, of meeting in Varna, Bulgaria) and a host of local musicians along with singer Vera Kondratieva from Siberia. You would expect to hear a melding of Scandinavian and traditional Siberian music on Timent Areh, but this also …
Iranian poet and balladeer Hushang Ebtehaj passed away on August 10, 2022, but left an incredibly rich body of work. This compilation, released by Tehran-based record label Khosousi, brings together Ebtehaj’s best interpreters, such as Mohammad Reza Sharjarian and his son Homayoun,as well as Alireza Eftekhari, Hossein Ghavami, Mohammad Motamedi and Alireza Ghorbani. Each is …
Read more “Various Artists – Ten Songs from Houshang Ebtehaj”
Belarus is not what one would think of as a Brazilian music hotspot, though, if my friends in the country could enlighten me to the local music scene, I would really appreciate it. Still, Soyuz, led by singer Alex Chumak blend a Brazil-meets-Santana-meets-funk beat and this album engages you quickly, making the listener want to …
Read more “Soyuz (Союз) – Force of the Wind (Сила ветра)”
Welcome to the world of Finnish tango as brought to you by Uusikuu, who celebrate their 16th year with this charmer of a disc. As this wonderful release from the ever wonderful CPL-Music isn’t on Bandcamp, I would like to point you to their Qobuz website, as I’m not much of a fan of Spotify. …
On October 13th,the African music world world lost an absolute demigod in the form of Verckys Kiamuangana Mateta. How important was he? Well, going by Wikipedia, he, “was a Congolese saxophonist, composer, bandleader, producer, record label founder, and music-business executive. He was renowned as a talented and prolific musician, and was the first indigenous African …
Los Camperos de Valles are Huastecan musicians and are considered to be national treasures in their native Mexico. This album, released by Smithsonian-Folkways, serves as a great introduction to the sound of son huasteco.
In a land of amazing bands and ensembles, MAiKA have managed to forcefully grab my attention. While they call themselves an alternative dance-punk band, there’s so much more to the music. The energy is amazing, the voices cut right through you in a way that most indie music can’t, and the fact that they combine brass …