December 30, 2011

Ethiopian Soul and Groove



...& a little present for your new year's eve

the Wallias Band,Alèmayèhu Eshèté,Gétatchèw Mèkurya,Mahmoud Ahmed & co
during  their heyday and
doing it to death....

a1-Wallias Band-Muziqawi Silt
a2-Alèmayèhu Eshèté And Hirut Bèqèlé-Tèmèlès
a3-Samuel Bèlay-Aynotchesh Yerèfu
a4-Ayalèw Mèsfin-Hasabé
a5-Seyoum Gèbrèyès & Wallias Band-Muziqa Muziqa
b1-Gétatchèw Mèkurya-Yègènèt Muziqa
b2-Mahmoud Ahmed-Kulun  Mankwalèsh
b3-Tamrat Fèrèndji -Antchin Yagègnulet
b4-Assèlèfètch Ashinè & Géténèsh Kebrèt-Amlak Abét Abét

my rip of 




December 27, 2011

Balžalorsky Drašler 3o - Wu-wei




















Vitja Balžalorsky - guitar, electronics
Jošt Drašler - bass
Vid Drašler - drums and other sounds


Young, Slovenian jazz trio with mature sound, left me surprised, even more when I noticed their age. I put the Cd in the stereo and some warm, pleasant tones filled the room, even my three and a half year old gave me an approving look nodding his head and lifting his eyebrows. There is an review on http://zalozba.radiostudent.si, please use translator,my English is too bad to translate it myself  and I am also a lazy ass. Some comparison has been made with the ECM material,  the peacefulness of John Abercrombie's jazz  also has been mentioned, and some praises of Jošt Drašler's firm base, I agree with all of those claims, all is in favour of those three great musicians, that I hope that they look at a wonderful future.


Wu-wei by Balzalorsky/Drasler 3o

December 25, 2011

Group Doueh-beatte harab



Group Doueh is part of a family entertainment business run by Salmou Baamar (aka Doueh), a native of Dakhla, Western Sahara. The rest of the group includes vocalists Halima Jakani (Baamar's wife) and Bashiri Touballi and keyboardist Jamaal Baamar (his son). Rhythm duties are shared between collective hand claps, Halima’s tbal (a hand drum), and the keyboard’s drum programs.

As a youth, Baamar listened to cassettes of James Brown and Jimi Hendrix imported from Spain. His first experiences as a professional musician were playing at local parties coincided with Mauritania’s occupation of Dakhla. You can hear both Western rock influence and Mauritanian rhythms in his music, which he’s been performing and marketing on cassette for over a quarter century throughout the Western Sahara region. Doueh plays electric guitar and  the tinidit (or tidinit),the Moorish four-stringed lute.



I liked beatte harab from the beginning
even more  than their 2 first records as this is a more straight forward traditional recording .
today  I checked my files and found an impressive number of  dls
without posting it anywhere..
just happy that people began appreciating  them  for their  music 
at last and not for any (stupid) hype---so here it is in the light of day.








December 14, 2011

Tamara Obrovac & Transhistria ensemble - Sve pasiva (All fades away)



















1 Gredu lita / Years pass by (4:40)
2 Sve pasiva / All fades away (5:01)
3 Ne plači Lucija / Don't cry Lucija (5:55)
4 Ča mi povida more / What sea tels me (5:58)
5 Cansoneita / Chanson (6:00)
6 Sexuvalna (5:42)
7 Duet / Duo (3:30)
8 Stila / quiet (3:30)
9 Sudba ti je došla / Your faith has come (4:21)
10 Divojka / A girl (4:44)
11 Ona je čekala / She has waited (6:10)
12 Črno zlo / Black evil (4:57)
13 Sexuvalna live - bonus track (4:53)

Life is short, don't waste time
a tune, write a rhyme
all will pass, even sound
what's to do, you demand
listen, laugh, have fun
and be thegoodone




The composer singer and flutist Tamara Obrovac, is one of the most impressive artists on the Croatian music scene, she is one of those musicians to whom jazz means a path to understanding music as a whole. Moreover, it has ushered her towards an intensive investigation of her own regional music awareness, so she offers us a new musical journey through the Istrian and Mediterranean spaces and times. Istria is here homeland, beautiful Croatian region, a North Adriatic peninsula, particular for It's musical and dialectal tradition, which is the creative force of her works. She writes lyrics in a local dialect and sings in an ancient dialect which is not spoken any more - the Istriotic dialect.

Her international Transhistria Ensemble incorporates elements of Istrian and Mediterranean national music, jazz, and many elements of modern music, and her music, completely original and autochthonous, goes beyond time and geographical boundaries, thus becoming a universal artistic message, establishing Tamara Obrovac as an exceptional artist who managed to create her own unique musical expression. This creative musician has become known for her highly aesthetic performances, her interpretations are suffused with spontaneity, inventive improvisation, freedom, humour and the ability to communicate with the audience, an artist of a strong persona, a life and artistic force able to enchant any audience...

As she said: “jazz is my freedom, and my roots are my inner truth...”

source

Personal note,
For me this is the best thing I heard In Croatian Discography. A balsam for a Mediterranean soul.




December 7, 2011

Kiko Dinucci, Juçara Marçal & Thiago França -Metá Metá


a little shout out for a very recent record that managed to become (almost) an instant  classic! in 2011? well,this is what I  call a big achievement-the comparisons with Baden Powell's /Vinicius de MoraesAfro-Sambas were inevitable(and  the original Afro-Sambas are always here to judge for yourself)
enjoy Metá Metá  and  join (as I did) their club of fans-for their originality ...
















The first album by Metá-Metá achieves two remarkable things; it manages to sound unbelievably fresh as well as sounding as if it could have come from Brazilian music’s hey-day of the 1960s.
Metá-Metá is essentially three musicians, Juçara Marçal on lead vocals, Kiko Dinucci on guitar and backing vocals, and Thiago França on sax and flute. Throughout this debut album I had the feeling I was listening to a long-lost Afro-Sambas tape, which I mean as the greatest tribute. This is guitar work as accomplished as Baden Powell, vocals from Marçal that are equal to greats such as the Maria Bethania and Maria Creuza. And while it will take me a while to decipher whether the lyrics are as strong as those of Vinicius de Moraes, this overall is an album that has that same environment that bestowed those ground-breaking Afro-Samba albums of the 60s.










Kiko Dinucci has been improving as a samba guitarist over the years, as well as becoming more and more embroiled in the world of candomblé, an Afro-Brazilian religion with a strong dance and musical element. In Juçara Marçal he has partnered with a singer who is just as passionate as the religion. The added atmospherics applied by Thiago França add another dimension to this music but it is the voice of Marçal and Dinucci’s dextrous, direct guitar-playing which steal the show.
The opening track “Vale do Jucá” and “Vias de Fato” are the two tracks that most readily resemble the works of Vinicius de Moraes and Baden Powell on the original Afro-Sambas, both strong samba songs with the eerie atmosphere that seemed to imbue many of those original songs. As a contrast “Umbigada” is a sunny melody that sings straght to the heart with a great telepathy between the guitar and flute that intertwine on the way to making the gorgeous melody.



Interestingly the repeated refrain and whispered vocals of “Papel Sulfite” bring to mind Juana Molina, an artist coming from a very different background. Other songs that push Metá-Metá in new directions are “Oranian”, a full band effort which occasionally erupts into a cacophony of drums and sax with Marçal’s singing almost rap-like in it’s directness and flow; and “Obá Iná” which starts with a guitar line which could easily have come from one of the punk bands that Dinucci was in in his early days. This track and the following “Obatalá” are two where there seems to be more of a jazz connection with cymbals crashing, França playing a bigger role on sax and there generally being a sense of free-form construction.












Metá-Metá is truly an extraordinary record, one with a strong candomblé heart – the gods Oxum, Xangô and Obatala feature heavily on these songs – but that also works as a great samba and jazz record. Kiko Dinucci and Juçara Marçal originally worked together on the 2009 album Padê, which was under their two names. That record had it’s moments, but it’s here as Metá-Metá with the presence of Thiago França that they have really managed to find their feet and produce something timeless which will surely be revered for some time, as well as vying with Criolo for the best album of 2011.

review from sounds and colours 

You can download Metá-Metá for free from  
Kiko Dinucci’s website