Category: World Music

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Although over the past twenty years or so Cape Verde, the tiny island nation comprised of an archipelago of 10 different, volcanic islands off the Northwestern coast of Africa has been hailed as one of the continent’s most stable democracies, its history suggests that things were very different. With a prime location in the Atlantic Ocean, the island nation was uninhabited until the 15th century, when the Portuguese colonized it, established it was not only the first European settlement in the tropics; but as a major commercial center and stopover point for the Transatlantic Slave Trade during the 16th and 17th centuries. The decline and eventual abolition of the slave trade in the 19th century resulted in a crippling economic crisis; however, because of the island’s location in the middle of major shipping lanes, it quickly became an important commercial center and port. Interestingly, with few natural resources and inadequate sustainable investment from the Portuguese, who had controlled the island nation for the better part of 300 years, Cape Verde’s citizens had become increasingly frustrated with colonial rule.

During the late 1940s and early 1950s, a series of independence and nationalist movements across colonized Africa began sprouting up across Africa –including Cape Verde. In 1951, Portugal changed the island nation’s status from a colony to overseas province in an attempt to blunt Cape Verdeans growing nationalism; however, by 1956 Amilcar Cabral led a group of Cape Verdeans and Guineans, who formed the African Party for the Independence of Guinea and Cape Verde (PAIGC). The group demanded improvement in economic, social and political conditions in Cape Verde and Portuguese Guinea — and interestingly enough, formed the basis of both nations’ independence movement. After moving its headquarters to Conakry, Guinea in 1960, the PAIGC began an armed rebellion the following year, which resulted in a bloody and complicated civil war that had Soviet Bloc-supported PAIGC fighting Portuguese and African troops.

Portuguese Guinea declared independence in 1973 and was granted de jure independence the following year as Guinea-Bissau. Amilcar Cabral led Cape Verde’s burgeoning independence movement until his assassination that same year, then led by Cabral’s half-brother Luis Cabral, who led the archipelago nation to independence in 1975. Much like their counterparts across the continent, the tiny island nation suffered through the similar ills of a society born by and influenced by colonialism, slavery and greed struggling to integrate into a rapidly globalizing world — and not quite knowing how to do so. The sense of detachment from the modern world fostered among Cape Verdeans a yearning to integrate, to connect with the larger world in any way that they could. And those who emigrated to the cosmopolitan European cities didn’t find much respite as Cape Verdeans were viewed as “hot-blooded” “dropouts” and “juvenile delinquents.” However, with the ready availability of electronic instruments, a doorway to a sense of modernity and an perceived anchor in their adopted homes was understandably seductive. As Val Xalino, a Cape Verdean-born, Gothenburg, Sweden-based electronic music artist and pioneer of his birthplace’s electronic sound explains in press notes “Cape Verdeans were celebrating their independence and with that the dancing became even more important.People wanted to hear something different. They wanted the synthesizer!”

Émigré musicians began traveling back and forth between Europe and their island homeland with luggage packed with synthesizers and MIDI instruments. And although many were primarily urban-based, musicians began frequent traveling to the countryside to learn the rhythms and melodies of rural farmers, frequently sampling melodies played off of slightly off-tune and damaged accordions and other field recordings. The result was this weird and compelling sound that drew from folk melodies and rhythms and contemporary electronic production — and from both African and European influences. The hearts and minds of a new nation of passionate, musically-included people were enthralled, including Paulino Viera, who would quickly become the island nation’s most important, beloved and influential musician.

Veira was especially drawn to keyboard-based instruments as he had honed his skills playing organ and piano at a Catholic seminary. His musical career started in earnest as a backing member of the renowned vocalist Cesaria Evora, whose cavaquinho-based folk songs received international attention while being instrumental in establishing the island nation as a music scene worthy of your attention — especially if you were into music across the wildly diverse African Diaspora. Interestingly, an underground electronic music scene had started with Viera leading charge once he relocated to Lisbon, Portugal, where he lead Voz de Cabo Verde, a beloved ensemble that frequently collaborated with other Cape Verdean-born musicians across the Diaspora. As Elisio Gomes, a Cape Verdean-born, Paris-based vocalist, who collaborated with Veira often, explained in press notes ““Paulino was the most visionary. He always had this gift to be 10 years ahead of his time. That’s why our music sounds like it was produced today.”

Now, as I’ve mentioned frequently on this site, the technological advances brought forth by computers and the Internet have made discovering new and extremely rare, lost music from known and little known artists much easier, all while contributing to the proliferation of extremely niche based labels, who are willing to take careful and thoughtful risks based around the tastes and listening habits of their staff and their most fervent followers. Naturally, it meant these smaller, niche labels would frequently spend their time re-introducing artists, whose work was so far ahead of its time that audiences just couldn’t grasp it upon its initial release — and yet fills in an important gap historically speaking; re-introducing regionally favored artists, whose work should have seen a bigger audience but didn’t; releasing music from various locations around the world that Westerners should know and love but was largely ignored; to provide an alternate history of developments across a genre — based on a region or a country that Westerners had long ignored and so on. And adding to a growing list of small labels releasing cool stuff, Ostinato Records will be releasing a cool compilation of electronic music from Cape Verde — a compilation in which the aforementioned Paulino Veira contributes to about half the songs — titled Ostinato Records Presents: Synthesize The Soul: Astro-Atlantic Hypnotica From The Cape Verde Island 1973-1988.

And through 18 extremely diverse tracks, the compilation will reveal how immigration from Cape Verde to Europe and the US created an alternate history of electronic music that had been largely ignored by most Westerners. Manuel Gomes’ “Jelivrà Bo Situaçon” pairs propulsive African percussion, shuffling Nile Rodgers-like funk guitar, twisting and turning keyboard chords played on what sounds like an old Casio keyboard paired with Gomes’ softly yearning, bittersweet vocals and is the compilation’s first single. Sonically speaking while the song clearly has the mark of either decidedly lo-fi production or comes as the result of re-mastering from old analog masters, it possesses a hypnotic, cosmic glow with groove and melody turning into one cohesive unit. And while being a bit bittersweet, the song at its core possesses the sense of unbridled freedom and possibility of the dance floor, and the hopes and dreams of a new nation learning to create its own image and history for itself.

 

 

 

 

Video by William Ruben Helms

Throwback: Tinariwen Live at the Bataclan, November 2016

Over the past few days, as 2016 was coming to a close, I had been looking a bit back at the past when I stumbled across this live footage of Tinariwen performing at the Bataclan in Paris, back in November.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: The Humanist and Globalist Pop Sounds of Daby Touré

Daby Touré is a Mauritanian-born, Paris-based singer/songwriter, who has had a lifelong love and obsession that began with listening to The Police, Stevie Wonder and Michael Jackson over the radio; however, he can trace the origins of his music career to when he taught himself the basics of guitar, while possessing an instinct that music was to be his life.

As a teenager, Touré relocated to Paris and his lifelong passion for music gradually drew him away from his studies in business; in fact, Touré began fully immersing himself in Paris’ jazz scene. And after several years of experimenting with his sound and songwriting, Touré met electronic music artist and producer Cyrille Dufay in 2003 — and the duo collaborated on Touré’s critically applauded breakthrough album Diam, an album that was signed to Peter Gabriel’s Real World Records. Interestingly, as a result the Mauritanian-born, Paris-based singer/songwriter opened for Gabriel during the renowned British artist’s 2004 Growing Up World Tour, which allowed Touré to have a growing international profile — with the album being added to playlists across France and the UK.

In 2006, the Mauritanian-born, Paris-based singer/songwriter was nominated for Discovery of the Year in that year’s BBC World Music Awards and he released his sophomore effort, in which he collaborated with sound engineer Ben Finlay, who has worked with Peter Gabriel, Sting, Simply Red, Jeff Beck and Robert Plant; and mixer and engineer Tom Oliver, who has worked with Sinead O’Connor, U2, Seun Kuti, Tony Allen, Susheela Raman and Charlie Winston. The following year saw the release of his third full-length effort Stereo Spirit, an album praised internationally for material that possessed catchy hooks and singalong-worthy lyrics — while pushing his sound towards the genre-defying.

By 2009, Touré collaborated with bluesman Skip McDonald on the Call My Name EP, an effort that Sing Out! described as being “neither African nor blues, but instead pulls from both and also from rock, a touch of pop and even dub for a unique, appealing and — its as to be said — quite commercial sound. The two voices and styles complement each other perfectly, and the songs they’ve created – for they seem more like creations than compositions – summon up echoes of their histories, but end up in a hybrid that’s essentially completely new.” With the success of his collaboration with McDonald, Touré has collaborated with an increasing number of internationally recognized artists including French pop artists Francis Cabrel and Maxime Le Forestier on Touré’s 2012 French language effort Lang(u)age — and he’s performed alongside Bob Geldof, Rihanna and Enzo Avitabile, among others.

As Touré explains in press notes “I was born in Africa And all the traditional music I picked up when I was young is still in me and that doesn’t change. But in my music I am still searching, and mixing, and trying things and that’s what I am doing now. I have travelled far from the ‘traditional’ or ‘folkloric’ music of my country.” In fact, over the past few years, the Mauritanian-born, French-based singer/songwriter has increasingly has merged the linguistic sounds of the six languages he speaks while moving towards a more globalized and universal sound — all while maintaining the accessibility that won him international attention.

Although his most recent effort was 2015’s Amonafi, which was released through renowned indie label Cumbancha Records, the internationally renowned singer/songwriter will be in town for two sets at Subrosa on Thursday night and to celebrate the occasion, released the music video for album single “Oma.” Sonically “Oma” is a breezy pop song that owes a debt to dub and reggae as much as it does to traditional African folk music in a seamless fashion and with an infectious, crowd-pleasing hook Throughout, Touré sings in several different languages — including English for part of the song’s hook, which gives the song a jet-setting, globalist universality. And yet, the song draws from a personal experience. As Touré explains of the song “One day as I was walking down the street, I passed a woman and her children. She was alone, sitting on the ground, and asking for charity and nobody seemed to care. This woman spoke to me that day. She inspired this song. Oma is this mother’s cry.”

The recently released music video for the song is a fairly straightforward take on the song, that follows after the song’s thematic concern with the video having Touré encountering a homeless woman and her child, and Touré approaching this woman and her child for a friendly and empathetic conversation that influences his song.

New Audio by William Ruben Helms

With the 2015 release of their excellent, sophomore effort Manual, the Brazilian psych rock quartet Boogarins received attention internationally and the band quickly became a JOVM mainstay artist for a decidedly Brazilian take on psych rock as their work has drawn from their country’s incredibly rich and diverse musical and cultural history — with lyrics completely written and sung in Brazilian Portuguese, making them among the forefront of an burgeoning Brazilian rock renaissance.

During a busy run of international touring, the Latin Grammy-nominated act holed up in house near Austin, TX‘s SPACE Studios for most of the summer, and they spent their time writing and recording new material in between a several weeks- long Austin club residency, which included the recently released  “Elogio a Instituição do Cinismo,” a single that’s a decided sonic departure as the band incorporated thumping beats and backbeats, swirling electronics and abrasive and buzzing guitars to create a malevolently brewing storm of sound that evoked both a fucked up hallucination and a rowdy, dance-floor friendly stomp.

The band’s latest single was quietly released the hallucinatory, Beatles “Revolution # 9” meets Middle Eastern and classical Indian music-like single “Olhos” as a special Christmas gift to their friends and fans, adding to a big Christmas Day 2016 bounty that included Run The Jewels‘ third album, Run The Jewels 3.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: JOVM Mainstays Boogarins Return with Hallucinatory and Abrasive Visuals for Their Boundary-Pushing New Single

During a rather busy bit of international touring the Latin Grammy-nominated act, Boogarins, holed up in house near Austin, TX’s SPACE Studios for most of the summer, and they spent their time writing and recording new material in between a several weeks- long Austin club residency. the band’s latest single “Elogio a Instituição do Cinismo” (translated into English, the title is “Praise the Institution of Cynicism”)is a decided sonic departure as the band incorporates the use of thumping beats and breakbeats, swirling and whirling electronics, abrasive and buzzing guitars to create a malevolent and angrily brewing storm of sound that’s paired with vocals that manage to be both dreamily placid yet pissed off. While being hallucinatory, the song manages to be a rowdy, furious almost dance floor-like stomp, revealing a band that’s readily and aggressively pushing psych rock and Brazilian rock into strange, yet excitingly new directions.

Filmed and edited by Victor Souza and featuring collages by Beatriz Perini, the recently released lyric and subtitled video emphasizes the bitter, vitriol-fueled critique of society at the heart of the song, suggesting that society encourages people to be deceptive and allows people to be used as means for more ends in themselves. The collages help emphasize the song’s whirling malevolent storm.

World Music by William Ruben Helms

Live Concert Review: Xylouris White with Marissa Anderson at National Sawdust

November 11, 2016

 

Those who know me the best know that I lead an insanely full life. I commute back and forth between my apartment in Queens and my full-time day job as an Acquisitions Editor at a downtown Manhattan-based book publisher, run this site on the side as a mostly full-time effort, participate in a radio segment that airs Fridays on Norway’s P4 Radio and on occasion I even have time for a social life. And if I had a 40-hour day, I’d probably squeeze in even more that I’d need to do or would like to do! As you can imagine, with all of those various and competing obligations it can be difficult to spend some time to actually sit down and write in a way that I’d like; but as a wise man once rhymed “the hustle don’t sleep.”

Last month, I was at one of Williamsburg’s newest and most intimate venues, National Sawdust to catch the highly-acclaimed duo Xylouris White along with the incredibly talented Northern California-born, Portland, OR-based guitarist Marisa Anderson. Now, if you’ve been frequenting this site over the past month or two, you may recall that Xylouris White is comprised of Comprised of Melbourne, Australia-born, New York-based drummer Jim White, who’s best known as a member of the internationally acclaimed instrumental rock act Dirty Three and for collaborating with an incredible list of equally renowned artists including PJ Harvey, Nina Nastasia, Cat Power, Bill Callahan a.k.a. Smog and others; and beloved Crete-born vocalist and laouto player Giorgos Xylouris, best known as the frontman of Xylouris Ensemble and the son of legendary vocalist and lyra player Psarantonis Xylouris. The duo’s collaboration together can trace its origins back to the early 90s when the renowned Cretan vocalist and laouto player was touring through Australia in the early 90s. At the time, White was a member of Melbourne, Australia-based avant garde rock band Venom P. Stinger, when he met and befriended the younger Xylouris. When White along with bandmates Warren Ellis (violin and bass) and Mick Turner (guitar and bass) formed The Dirty Three, Giorgios Xylouris would collaborate with the band whenever he and his Ensemble were in town. Interestingly enough, the members of The Dirty Three have publicly cited Psarantonis and Giorgios Xylouris as being major influences on their sound and approach.

Although White and Xylouris have known each other for more than 20 years, it wasn’t until 2013 when they decided that should collaborate together, and it was accelerated when White played with both Psarandonis and Giorgios Xylouris at an All Tomrorow’s Parties Festival, curated by Nick Cave. Unsurprisingly, the duo’s long-held mutual admiration has deeply influenced how they write and perform music – and in some way, it sounds as though the duo is dancing, as at any given point they could be accompanying or leading each other and at any given moment and their live sound reflects that same mischievous fluidity while drawing simultaneously from both contemporary and ancient folk; in fact, during their National Sawdust, Giorgios Xylouris sang the lyrics of a song based around a 14th century love poem in his native Greek and the although the majority of the audience didn’t understand the words, we could understand the ache and longing within the song, punctuated by White’s jazz-like drumming. Several other ballads throughout their set evoked the imagery of herders and farmers singing around campfires with friends and family, before passing on the instrument to the next person.

While watching the duo playing “Black Peak” off their recently released Black Peak album, the stomping and rollicking song took on an improvisational and jazz-like feel as you can see both musicians practically having a non-verbal conversation with each other – in which at any given point White or Xylouris will say to the other “now, it’s your turn.” “Hey Musicians,” took on a wildly, mischievous, almost danceable feel; in fact, off to the corner of the room, I saw a few people dancing and stomping about with a joyous ecstasy while the rest of the crowd was enraptured by the old pros, doing their thing with an effortlessly cool, self-assuredness while walking a tightrope between an elegantly simple beauty and a muscular forcefulness.

Northern California-born, songwriter and composer Marissa Anderson is a classically trained guitarist, who dropped out of college at 19 to walk across the country and eventually settle in Portland, OR, where she’s currently based. Interestingly, Anderson is a classically trained guitarist, who has honed her skills playing in country, jazz and circus bands, collaborating with Beth Ditto, Sharon Van Etten, Circus Des Yeux and others, and has written the scores to a number of short films.  With the release of her first solo efforts – namely, her 2009 debut The Golden Hour, 2011’s Mercury and 2013’s Traditional and Public Domain Songs Anderson has developed a reputation for a sound that channels the entire history of guitar-based music and stretches the boundaries of tradition, as many of her compositions are not only based upon the landscape of American music but attempt to re-imagine them as her work possesses elements of minimalism, electronic music, drone, 20th Century Classical Music, blues, jazz, gospel, country, folk and Americana – often simultaneously.

Anderson’s latest effort Into the Light has Anderson leaving the Appalachian folk and Delta blues that first won her attention from the likes of Billboard, Rolling Stone, NPR, Spin Magazine, Pitchfork and Wire among others – with Into The Light landing on Spin Magazine’s best of 2016 and her split LP with Tashi Dorji being named one of the best experimental records of 2015 by Pitchfork and The Out Door. Anderson’s latest effort Into the Light, has the composer and songwriting leaving Appalachia and the Delta Blues – with the album’s ten compositions written as though they were the soundtrack of an imaginary sci-fi/western in which she tells the story of a lost visitor wandering the Sonoran Desert. And as a result, the material on the album is naturally cinematic and anachronistic in a similar fashion to the night’s headliner – in the sense that the material manages to feel both contemporary and yet timeless.

Adding to a growing national and international profile, Anderson has made appearances at the Copenhagen Jazz Festival, Sweden’s Gagnef Festival, Fano Free Folk Festival, Le Guess Who and the Festival of Endless Gratitude, as well as opening for the renowned duo Xylouris White during their brief East Coast tour, a tour which also included a stop at National Sawdust last month.  Accompanying herself with only her guitar, Anderson’s set further cemented her reputation for material that went across both the breadth and length of American music – briefly touching upon early Delta blues, folk, murder ballads and country but a with a uniquely earthy and post-modernist take, while being deeply contemplative. She’s been known to perform a version of “House Carpenter,” a title given to most American derivatives of the British folk song “Demon Lover,” a song roughly about a woman, who takes up a lover, has an affair and leaves her husband and kid – only to discover that she’s fallen in love with a demon/Satan; however, Anderson’s rendition, as she explained before she played it was meant to consider the woman’s perspective, which not only humanizes the song’s main character, but manages to be pensive and lonely in a similar fashion to “Make Sure My Grave Is Kept Clean.” Interestingly, Anderson has frequently played a medley of both songs – and it shouldn’t be surprising as the narrators of both songs wind up dead and in some way plead for forgiveness, understanding, empathy through the years.

The material off Into the Light manages to evoke natural phenomenon – a song inspired by Anderson’s time in the desert, observing harshly swirling and howling winds can make you picture people huddling in from dust storms or sitting around a fire, just listening and thinking. It was a song that possessed an elegant and deceptive simplicity. And the entire time the crowd was enraptured by this woman playing instrumental compositions that could burrow deep into the earth, yearn and arch themselves heavenward or just focus on the simple joys of being happy and existing in a particular place in time. Simply put it was a fascinating night of old pros capturing a crowd and taking them in challenging, new sonic and thematic directions.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: JOVM Mainstays La Femme Return with Surreal and Nightmarish Visuals For Their Latest Single “Mycose”

The Parisian collective’s highly-anticipated sophomore effort Mystere was released earlier this year and you may recall that I’ve written about three of the album’s singles — Sphynx,” a track that manages to evoke a lingering fever dream, “Ou va la mode” a somewhat stripped down track that seemed as though the French act were returning to the breezy and decidedly French take on surfer rock that comprised Le Podium # 1 but with warped, carnival from hell-like organ and “Septembre,” a track that sounded indebted to 60s psych rock and psych pop with a mournful, bittersweet air. The album’s fourth and latest single “Mycose” is a moody and somewhat atmospheric track comprised of undulating synths, a propulsive bass line, some industrial clang and clatter paired with punchily cooed lyrics and a psychedelic-leaning guitar solo. And of course, Mystere’s latest single will further cement the French collective’s reputation for crating a propulsive and danceable sound that also manages to be difficult to pigeonhole.

Directed by Paul Gondry, the son of renowned director Michel Gondry, the recently released video for “Mycose” was shot on the streets of New York and while coolly seductive, the video possesses a nightmarish horror-film meetings high-fashion ad logic.

Video by William Ruben Helms

Live Footage: Eddie Palmieri Performs Songs from Harlem River Drive

Eddie Palmieri is a legendary, Grammy-winning New York born and -based pianist, composer and bandleader who has released a number of beloved and highly-regarded Latin funk albums that have pushed the boundaries of what the genre should sound like and concern itself thematically, through renowned labels including Fania Records, Alegre Records, Tico Records, RMM and Concord Picante. Back in 1971, Palmieri along with a new backing band Harlem River Drive wrote and recorded Harlem River Drive, a sociopolitically charged album inspired by the inequality that his fellow Puerto Ricans faced in the New York of the early 1970s — and as a result, the album was a fiery and much-needed protest that featured novelistic lyrics that immersed you into its creators world. Interestingly, the album wasn’t a major commercial success but over the years, it became a cult-favorite album, while being as powerful and relevant today as it was when the album was originally released.

Earlier this year, Red Bull Music Academy invited Palmieri and his backing band to perform the material off Harlem River Drive live for the first time in several decades on what turned out to be a rainy afternoon and evening at Harem’s Marcus Garvey Park — and the folks at NPR’s Jazz Night in America shot some great live footage that includes album title track “Harlem River Drive,” “Seeds of Life” and “Comparasa.” Check it out by clicking on the link above and it’ll lead you to a full-screen embed.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: Turkish JOVM Mainstays The Away Days Return With Their Most Politically Charged Single to Date

Now, over the past couple of years, the Turkish indie rock quartet have released a series of singles that have that have seen international attention across the blogosphere, including this site where the band has added their name to a growing list of mainstay artists. Up until recently, it had been about a year since we had last heard from the renowned Istanbul-based quartet; but as it turns out, the band had been busy working on the material, which will comprise their highly-anticipated full-length debut effort. The album’s first two singles “Less Is More” and “World Horizon” were atmospheric yet lush tracks in which plaintive vocals were paired with ethereal and shimmering synths — while drawing from the band members’ lives as musicians in a society in which their efforts are viewed suspicious and seditious.

“Places to Go,” the third and latest single off the band’s forthcoming full-length debut is a lush and plaintive song featuring layers of shimmering guitar, a tight motorik-like groove and a soaring, anthemic hook — and in some way it makes the song sound as though it were inspired by classic shoegaze and contemporary pop and indie rock; however, the song manages to possess a deeply held tension as lyrically, the band draws from their lives and the lives of Turkish young people as the song touches upon the sense of frustration, boredom, oppression and conformity, lack of opportunity and their overall restlessness.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Orkesta Mendoza Returns with a Playfully Psychedelic Take on Cumbia

Now, as you may remember “Caramelos,” featuring Salvador Duran was the first single off the collective’s recently released album ¡Vamos A Guarachar!, and unsurprisingly the single managed to capture the act’s signature, genre mashing style –enormous tweeter and woofer rocking beats and synths, organ, twangy pedal steel guitar, a bit of mariachi, a bit of mambo, a bit of cumbia, a bit of flamenco, a bit of this and a bit of that are employed in a stomping dance floor-friendly song that manages to be familiar and alien and mischievously difficult to pigeonhole. And much like the work of a newer JOVM mainstay like El Dusty, this particular track should remind listeners and readers that arguably some of the most sonically inventive club banging music is coming from those who grew up in close proximity to the American-Mexican border.

The album’s latest single “Cumbia Volcadora” is a collaboration with renowned Mexican electronic music pioneer Camilo Lara is a swaggering, riotous and subtly modern take on the classic cumbia sound that kind of nods at Rob Base’s and DJ E-Z Rock’s “It Takes Two” thanks to a series of distorted vocal samples, El-Dusty’s “Cumbia Anthem” but with a psychedelic flair — and paired with a band playing one of the funkiest and tightest grooves I’ve heard in recent memory.

As for the recently released video is a wild visual collage of styles including animation, black and white footage of dancer dancing to the song, people wandering around and purchasing goods at a local market and of the band playing but superimposed with cartoon drawn masks, as well as homages to old movie posters and record art. And in some way it emphasizes the psychedelic nature of the song.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Comprised of Sophie, Annabel, Cecil and Georgia, Body Type are a Sydney, Australia-based — by way of Perth, Australia and Kiama, Australia — indie quartet that formed a little over six months ago and began receiving attention for material that thematically focuses on navigating heartbreak to the banality of life in in a moldy Redfern terraced house — and for opening for the likes of Gabriella Cohen, Cate Le Bon and The Coathangers. Adding to a growing national profile, the Sydney-based quartet recently signed to Our Golden Friend Records, who will be releasing the “Ludlow”/”264” 7 inch single, featuring their debut single “Ludlow” and their latest single, the moody and slow-burning “264.” While sounding as though it were indebted to jangling guitar pop and Phil Spector’s Wall of Sound-era production, the song manages to feature lyrics that describe the day-to-day life of in and around a shitty little house with a novelist’s attention to detail, a soaring bridge and a sinuous bass line holding it all together. It’s a gently swooning and moody take on a familiar and beloved sound — and it reveals a young band playing and writing gorgeous material with a cool, self-assuredness.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

With the 2015 release of their excellent, sophomore effort Manual, the Brazilian psych rock quartet Boogarins quickly became a JOVM mainstay artist. Now, if you’ve been frequenting this site over the past year or so, you’d recall that the internationally acclaimed psych rock quartet can trace their origins to when its founding members, Fernando “Dino” Almeida and Benke Ferraz started playing music together as teenagers in their hometown, the central Brazilian city of Goiânia. Interestingly, the music that the duo of Almedia and Ferraz began to write and eventually record quickly revealed a unique vision of psych pop that drew from their country’s incredibly rich and diverse musical and cultural history  — but with a decidedly modern viewpoint. And unlike a number of contemporary rock bands in their native Brazil, Boogarins were among one of the first, who wrote and sung lyrics completely in Brazilian Portuguese.

The release of the band’s full-length debut As Plantas Que Curam reverberated throughout Brazil as it was a massive critical and commercial success — without the support of a major label or a publicity firm pushing the album. As the band rose to national prominence, they started to receive larger international attention, and as a result they’ve played some of the world’s largest and most popular festivals including   Austin Psych Fest, Burgerama, Primavera Sound Festival, as well as playing headlining shows in clubs in London, Paris, Barcelona and New York. And while touring to support their their full-length debut, the members of the quartet had began writing and revising the material that would eventually comprise Manual. Now, interestingly enough, the material on their sophomore effort was specifically conceived as a diary or dream journal, which gives the material a deeply personal, almost stream-of-consciousness-like feel; but it also reveals a band that has become increasingly sociopolitically conscious as the album’s lyrical content also draws from the complex socioeconomic and political that affected their homeland’s communities before, during and after the 2014 World Cup — namely that entire neighborhoods and communities were being razed for massive commercial developments that helped multinational, global corporations and their interests make money hand over fist instead of uplifting those who desperately needed uplift.

During a rather busy bit of international touring the Latin Grammy nominated act, the quartet holed up in house near Austin, TX‘s SPACE Studios for most of the summer, and they spent their time writing and recording new material in between a several weeks along Austin club residency. the band’s latest single “Elogio a Instituição do Cinismo” (translated into English, the title is “Praise the Institution of Cynicism”)is a decided sonic departure as the band incorporates the use of thumping beats and breakbeats, swirling and whirling electronics, abrasive and buzzing guitars to create a malevolent and angrily brewing storm of sound that’s paired with vocals that manage to be both dreamily placid yet pissed off. While being hallucinatory, the song manages to be a rowdy, furious almost dance floor-like stomp, revealing a band that’s readily and aggressively pushing psych rock and Brazilian rock into strange, yet excitingly new directions.

 

 

 

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Comprised of Melbourne, Australia-born, New York-based drummer Jim White, who’s best known as a member of the internationally acclaimed instrumental rock act Dirty Three and for collaborating with an incredible list of equally renowned artists including PJ Harvey, Nina Nastasia, Cat Power, Bill Callahan a.k.a. Smog and others; and beloved Crete-born vocalist and laouto player Giorgos Xylouris, the son of renowned vocalist and lyra player Psarandonis Xylouris, best known for leading the Xylouris Ensemble, the world music duo Xylouris White can actually trace their origins to when the renowned Cretan and his ensemble was touring Melbourne in the early 1990s. At the time, White was a member of Melbourne, Australia-based avant rock band Venom P. Stinger when he had met and befriended Xylouris, who later would collaborate with the members of Dirty Three whenever he was in Australia –and interestingly enough, the members of Dirty Three had at various points have publicly cited the renowned Cretan and his father as influencing their sound and approach.

And although White and Xylouris had known each other for quite some time, it wasn’t until 2013 that they decided to collaborate as a duo, a process which was accelerated when White played with Xylouris and Psaradonis at an All Tomorrow’s Parties festival that was specially curated by Nick Cave. Interestingly, the duo’s long-held mutual admiration has influenced how they the write and perform music — and in some way, it’s almost as though the duo is dancing together, as at any given point, they could be accompanying and leading each other, simultaneously and in a very fluid fashion. Interestingly, the duo’s debut Goats was influenced by Xylouris’ poetic analogy for their creative approach “Like goats walking in the mountain. They may not know the place, but they can walk easily and take risks and feel comfortable. Really, the goats inspired us.”

The duo’s sophomore effort Black Peak furthers their goat analogy as the album’s title is derived from a famous Cretan mountain, and the album, which was “recorded everywhere,” as Xylouris says in press notes and produced by Fugazi‘s Guy Picciotto reportedly has the band expanding upon their sound while focusing even more on ancient traditional sounds while having a subtly modern take, as the duo pushes each other harder, as you’ll hear on the rollicking and stomping album title track “Black Peak.”

The duo will be on a Stateside and Australian tour throughout November and December, and it’ll include a November 18 stop at National Sawdust. Check out the tour dates.

 

Tour Dates

Nov 15 – Northampton, MA – Iron Horse Music Hall

Nov 16 – New Haven, CT – BAR Nightclub

Nov 17 – Providence, RI – Columbus Theatre

Nov 18 – Brooklyn, NY – National Sawdust

Nov 20 – Somerville, MA – ONCE Lounge

Nov 22 – Burlington, VT – Arts Riot

Nov 23 – Montreal, QC – La Vitrola

Nov 24 – Wakefield, QC – The Black Sheep Inn

Nov 25 – Toronto, ON – The Drake Hotel

Nov 27 – Detroit, MI – Third Man Records

Nov 29 – Philadelphia, PA – Boot & Saddle

Nov 30 – Washington, DC – DC9

Dec 1 – Pittsburgh, PA – Club Café

Dec 2 – Louisville, KY – Zanzabar

Dec 3 – Chicago, IL – Beat Kitchen

Dec 4 – Cleveland, OH – Beachland Tavern

Dec 18 – Melbourne, Australia – Melbourne Recital Centre

 

 

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: Tinariwen Return with a Hypnotic and Triumphant New Single

Last month, I wrote about Elwan’s first single “Tenere Taqqal,” a slow-burning and hauntingly gorgeous song that possessed an understated yet aching longing for a way of life and for a home, which as Thomas Wolfe once wrote and the members of the band recognize, they may never be able to return to and will never have again. And certainly while there’s a tacit acknowledgement within the song that life continues onward as it always does, there’s also a brooding and pensive urgency within the song that comes from the members of the band recognizing that they have a sacred and profound duty of ensuring that something of the old traditions could be preserved and passed on to future generations. The album’s second single “Sastanàqqàm” is as the band’s Abdallah Ag Alhousseyni explains “an ode to the Sahara and its Nomads. It expresses the needs of the traveller as he crosses the desert on his mount. Essential needs: find water and a way to preserve it, find a good mode of transport. But also the love-hate relationship with the desert, the natural elements and the certainty that we will always go back to it.” Pairing those sentiments with a shuffling and deeply hypnotic groove and a propulsive and stomping percussion give the song a hopeful and downright joyous feel. At it’s core it’s the hope and promise of returning to the ancestral homeland — of its smell, of seeing beloved sights, of returning to the place where your ancestors have lived, played, prayed, wandered, hunted and died.

The band and their label have done a kind favor by providing an English translation of the song’s lyrics, which you can check out below.

Sastanàqqàm Lyrics

SASTANÀQQÀM

I QUESTION YOU

TÉNÉRÉ, CAN YOU TELL ME OF ANYTHING BETTER THAN TO HAVE YOUR FRIENDS AND YOUR MOUNT,
AND A BRAND NEW GOATSKIN, WATERTIGHT,
TO FIND YOUR WAY
BY THE LIGHT
OF THE FOUR BRIGHT STARS OF HEAVEN,
TO KNOW HOW
TO FIND WATER IN
THE UNLIKELIEST OF PLACES, AND ENLIST THE MOMENTUM OF THE WIND
TO HELP YOU MOVE FORWARD

TELL ME, TÉNÉRÉ
HOW YOU AND I
CAN REMAIN UNITED,
WITH NO HATE FOR EACH OTHER.
TÉNÉRÉ, I CAN NOW ADMIT THAT
I HAVE TRAVELLED FAR THROUGH THIS WIDE WORLD.
TÉNÉRÉ, I GIVE YOU MY OATH
THAT AS LONG AS I’M ALIVE,
I WILL ALWAYS COME BACK