I am not always sure anymore that the Django open reference is a plus for all productions. Of course it allows fans and afficionados to recognize the file quickly but […]

I am not always sure anymore that the Django open reference is a plus for all productions. Of course it allows fans and afficionados to recognize the file quickly but it may drew to an halt all the other ones. Diknu Schneeberger is an excellent player, way up most of the usual archetypal guitarists in…

Clap Hands: The album opens with a »choral« of hands doing the famous Bulgarian Voices basic rhythm, then a grand piano comes laying some deep chords à la Keith Jarrett »Windup« quartet before Tröndle starts to sing the theme with onomathopy. It’s seriously made and played, though hard yet to tell where it’s all going….

Cigarettes, drinks and shots, all laid on an obvious pub table, ladies and gentlemen altogether, partying and smiling (shows the cover). A very fair and honest album, nothing to hide, all to share, great players (from Netherlands). Some sort of happy energetic Rhythm & Blues with huge slices of soul, rock, ehtio-salsa or jazz. A…

Electronica lounge of a third, fourth and fifth kind: between old vintage sounds (video games, Casio etc.) and a little fairy-dreamy goes Nippon touch (go to bed children, adults are out tonight) – It’s mastered, well done and probably the product of a long process in some home studio before any release. Well behaved and…

Which »Voyage« will we find here? The Louis-Ferdinand Céline one or a reference to the fabulous Paul Motian trio album (with J-F Jenny Clark & Charles Brackeen, ECM)? None: a totally new one, another beautiful experience of its own kind – I liked it. The more I couldn’t tell what it was the more I…

The rather petshopboyish opening title is »USA Boys«, followed galore by eleven remixes. It has this 1980’s Glam-Electro-space-love-backroom flavour to it (vocals mixed from the bar, very wet). I cannot yet define if this is the soundtrack to an after party, or to sad awakenings, much after the party. It’s sustained, rather firm, definite, marchin‘…

If you ever dived once into Reggae, Dub, Ska and al … you probably stopped by now to confuse any pastiche or jam in the genre with the original Jamaican art (and it’s central diaspora). Of course it doesn’t mean this music cannot be reread or rewritten anyhow but here it’s pretty hard for me…

I love to put a new CD in my player while ignoring all about who is it, what genre, what stream, what origin. This happens generally about 80 per-cent of the time here. Good, Good, Good – so : What is ? It starts in some lost island and wild forrest, with birds and other…

It s totally random, I know, but I have a good feeling about this album just from looking at it, like it smiles to you "eat me, try me, buy me". Even the sheets says " Bjorn Swin is Unique. Full stop", so … And since the first sounds you enter someone‘ s world, living…

Very curious intro, real good actually, though very fusion-funk (Crusaders ), topped by a totally out of tune ( and out of much instruction on the instrument I guess too ) tenor saxophone. Then comes the horns in the back and the whole cheese-cake takes off. I havent been reading the liner notes so I…

I happen to have a twenty years old cousin from Belgrade passing right next to me while I  dig this CD out of the review pile, so I handled it to her and asked whom she might know from this compilation. But she laughed and went off. That doesnt mean anything I agree but it could too. The balkan soundsystem as i always experienced it myself is rather close to the Jamaican version : it s all over in the streets, in kiosks, cafés, bars, clubs and not in the cultural area at all where they do their best to prevent from it. Let‘ s say like in Vienna as to whether you look up towards Germany or rather simply around you and that s closer to Balkan ( it just is, cant help that ). This CD is very good and well selected as often wih Eastblok productions but sounds more like for people looking for a bite and taste of Balkan than anything close to being in Balkan. Vienna friends : get the real stuff on the market, there is plenty and it s cheap.

»Friends of Science« opens the album in most awakening sharp & smart beat possible. Funky you call it, but much more too as the Rebirth Brass Band cooks the second track and bayou-march the whole song. Call it music, it’ll be fine. Put down and dance along. »Double It« follows as the pusher we wanted…

Hank is Swiss, I get to know. Hanks like americana and maybe more over he likes the dreamed America as we’ve seen it in Europe. Although this particular album stands very well next to some New Orleans original productions. So what’s the point? Well, it’s really well played and produced, his voice has a lot…

  »Fugu« as you may know is the Japanese fish that may kill you if you don’t cut his back bone properly (and also a French orchestral pop artist’s name). For this project Scott Fields decided to use classical guitar (nylon strings) in order to melt in the rather chamber orchestra line-up (Geoff Brady on…

Chad Taylor (drums, vibraphone, electronics) and Rob Mazurek (cornet, electronics) in a new tale of the whole story – of course the legendary »Mu Sessions« of Don Cherry and Ed Blackwell (on BYG) soon comes to mind, but not so much because of the line-up than because the overall atmosphere, material or »direction« sorts of…

Leafcutter John on guitar and electronics in a Sebastian Rochford (drums) series of composition and production, featuring Peter Wareham & Mark Lookheart on tenor saxophones and Tom Herbert on double bass, all recorded in London. In many ways this instrumental album reminds me of the sort of »ear experience« one can have while walking London’s…

Do they call it »Scandi-Jazz«? It seems so. Here we go again: Hammond organ & keyboards trio with bass and drums playing full gaz, full intensity, full retro-move as well. You’ve heard most of this music already but you don’t remember it was by this trio. Might well have been by many other trios actually,…

Lavelle White, Sam Moore, Keb’Mo, James Hunter, Snooks Eaglin or Irma Thomas. All Lavish tracks and artists compiled here for your journey or car hi-fi system while stuck in some traffic jam. As much as this music is beautiful and taking you by the hand to enjoy a sunny day inside your head, there isn’t…

Why do I have always to review these new French chansons compilations, whereas many other non-French media partners may really enjoy it for what it is? Plus, the thing is, I know personally or worked with half of the artists on the album already. Of course I want to say beautiful things about Albin De…

Just a quote to open: »the music of the 70’s influenced me strongly«, says the Swiss pianist. An electric quintet with rhodes, guitar, saxophone, bass and drums in the tradition of »soul jazz«, crossover or labels like CTI, co-produced by Wolfgang Muthspiel for Material Records. This music is very close to a perfect re-reading of…

About everything I can dislike is available in this album. A girlie nosy vocalist singing like she’s going to be sixteen for ever (don’t ask me about the lyrics). A very nostalgic idea of music and sounds (like the good times of Joan Baez and Hank Williams should stay frozen forever). A rather ambiguous relation…

You can’t blame Björk for everything, Joni Mitchell’s responsible too (when not Emmylou Harris). Where do they file that particular album now? Jazz, pop, ambient, actual? It’s a bit like some Grace Jones backing track (spare mixes) without any Grace Jones but some white vocalist instead (Carol King?). I am being absolutely unfair here ?cause…

California, Fort Bragg, San Francisco, folks, landscapes and songs. A west-coast Françoise Hardy maybe some fourty years later? It is beautifully sung and played, it is all the love you wanted to hear and feel inside, it is also on the verge of Baden Powell’s early scoutism sometime (or Soeur Sourire’s Dominique-Nique-Nique). Another album that…

Isn\’t Omo some washing powder for dirty laundry? However: lo-fi and other post Beat Generation (The Ginsberg and his magic tempura period rather). Is this produced in Berlin while thinking of Chelsea New York or the Bowery as it never really existed? Do we need such albums? I don’t really, sorry. Omo is very low-fi…

After Lita Ford and her »Wicked Wonderland« all sounds pale, flat and sick to me anyway. It’s probably the first time I hear a Staubgold album opening with some Mexican Street Band, slowly faded into electronica though. It is actually a soundtrack to Veronique Ruggia movie (don’t ask me more). It’s pretty multi-directional to my…

A »Pro-Bama« move your ass and your vote will follow soundtrack? What’s this? A foonky strudel? Featuring Erykah Badu and Honey – I really don’t know – maybe the Greatful Dead meets George Clinton? What about better Prince the man known as) meets Snoop Dog featuring Carlos Santana (and Antonio Banderas on cow bell). I dont mean…