Top of the World
The editor's choice selection of the 10 best new releases, a track from each album appears on the issue's CD covermount.
Yerba Buena
Follow Me
Wrasse Records
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As on their previous albums, President Alien and Island Life, bilingualism is at the heart of Follow Me. Vocalists rap in Spanish, get ever so Latino in English, and on ëBla, Bla, Blaí join in huge choruses that combine spliced scratches of GW Bush with big-band blasts. Not since David Byrneís Rei Momo has such a lively dialogue between the US and the Caribbean been given this kind of soundtrack. On the fourth song, which features veteran funkster Joe Bataan, the message is unfettered: ëAll I want is a bilingual girlÖ two tongues are better than oneí. But the musical conversation between new urban beats and long fermented Latin American tunes is the main one ñ the albumís journey from cumbia through ska to contemporary club-oriented beats is thrilling and rich in surprises. Guests come in all shapes and sizes, with Orishas, Celia Cruz, Gogol Bordello, John Leguizamo and Diego ëEl Cigalaí popping in to add their two pesosí worth.
Chris Moss
Aman Aman
Musica i Cants Sefardis d'Orient i Occident
Galileo
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Aranda has a voice as strikingly beautiful as she is herself, and her partner LÛpez on ud, tambur, santur, lavta and cumbus leads a wonderful band playing a host of strings, wind and percussion. The music evolves from simple, introductory statements of mode, melody and theme, weaving a complex tapestry alive with gleaming textures and sumptuous decorative detail. The songsí subject matter moves from love to weddings to biblical stories to lullabies. Thereís much fun to be had in the lyrics: the vivid ëLos Guisandas de la Berenjenaí, for instance, describes seven different ways of preparing aubergine, and features a chorus dedicated ëTo my uncle Cerasi, who enjoys drinking wineí. Beautifully produced, the superb liner notes are in four languages.
Jan Fairley
Various Artists
Sevdalinka: Sarajevo Love Songs
Piranha
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The many fine musicians here include the wonderful Turkish accordionist and singer Muammer Ketenco?lu and the veteran sevdah singer Emina Ze?aj in a traditional performance with Turkish saz. But the most sublime track is surely ëSto te Nemaí by Sarajevo-born Jadranka Stojakovi?, who sang the official song of the Winter Olympics in 1984 before migrating to Japan where she recently recorded this with local musicians. This project, initiated by the Sarajevo label Yaman, is not backward looking, but about taking whatís valuable from an old ñ and in this case threatened ñ tradition and making viable and beautiful new music out of it. Itís also a demonstration of how great music has always been a product of cultural interchange. A Piranha triumph.
Simon Broughton
Various Artists
AuthenticitÈ: The Syliphone Years
Stern's
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In addition to exemplary performances by well known groups such as Bembeya, the Horoya Band, Keletigui, and Balla et ses Balladins, this collection contains some of the less famous Guinean groups and many of the tracks have never been available on CD before. Particularly notable are the neo-psychedelic extemporisations of 22 Novembre Band, Sombory Jazz, Palm Jazz, Syli Authentic, Nimba Jazz, and the explosive guitar interplay of the Tropical Djoli Band. The Syliphone label is one of the worldís most iconic record labels and the Sternís reissue series is a magnificent and authoritative way to enjoy the treasures of one of Africaís greatest musical nations.
Martin Sinnock
Peret
Que Levante El Dedo
K Industria/Rumba Classics
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Garriga also guests on the first album from Patriarcas de la Rumba. The group is an excellent idea: Tios Pali, Toni, Pepe ëEl Chinoí, Joanet and Rafael, uncle of Rafaelito Salazar are all solid bit players from the golden era. Itís also ethno-musically interesting, with rarely heard forms in their repertoire, such as the garrotÌn for example. Theyíre pretty perky in places. But overall, however, the rather laid-back jazzy Cuban twist to the arrangements and the charmingly aged voices are a touch too avuncular to provide the visceral excitement that the hardcore rumba junkie craves.
The revelation of the three is the new offering from Peret, the king of 60s pop-rumba, whose recent records have been patchy. Que Levante El Dedo is a triumphant return. Peretís voice is mature but not over the hill. The instrumentation ñ a close mesh of ventilador guitar, palmas, touches of electric lead guitar, bass and drums ñ is simple and strong. And the tunes ñ Peretís speciality since his days selling cartloads of pop-up cover EPs on the Costa Brava ñ are as catchy as ever. Real rumbas abound, on themes as diverse as dieting, grandchildren and Cuban studs. Thereís a plaintive Gypsy guajira and an unusual moritas, a sober melodic piece of flamenco a million miles from the anguished caterwauling that is nowadays de rigeur. Thereís even a terrific ëfunkyí with wah-wah guitar, organ, honking baritone sax and echo. Delicious. In the Buena Vista rumba stakes, Peret is the patriarch to put your money on.
Philip Sweeney
Budowitz
Live
Golden Horn Records
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But what really makes the disc remarkable is the repertoire, which is grouped according to ten of the gubernias, or administrative districts, where klezmer music was found in Eastern Europe. These include Galitsiye, Vitebk, Kiev and Transylvania in todayís Poland, and Belarus, Ukraine and Romania. Each district is represented by a short suite of pieces ñ gathered from written sources, old recordings and the oral tradition ñ which are joined together and played as they might be in a wedding sequence. Itís a repertoire that will be unfamiliar even to those with an extensive knowledge of klezmer music. Before World War II, Jews, Gypsies and local folk musicians often played together, and there are many connections between the Jewish and regional folk styles. In Nizhni Veretski, the town where the father of Cookie Segelstein, one of the violinists, lived, the klezmer band was made up of Gypsy, Ruthenian, Jewish and Hungarian musicians. And in the Transylvanian section of this disc, the music, played by Hungarian musicians, is pure Kalotaszeg style ñ not particularly Jewish but much loved by the Szatmar Rebbe, according to Joshua Horowitz. Amongst the highlights are the three tunes from Volakhay (Wallachia), the region of the Taraf de HaÔdouks, with some extraordinarily intense fiddle playing. Throughout the disc the music is raw and gutsy ñ played with great artistry and a sense of fun.
Simon Broughton
Adama Coulibaly
Salif Keita Presents Adama Coulibaly
Wanda Records
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Ibrahim Nabo is a Songhai from the north of Mali and makes a fuller, somewhat more modern sound with the addition in places of electric bass and guitar but which is still steeped in traditional rhythms. Particularly notable is the thrilling call-and-response contrast between his own gritty vocals and the sweeter tones of his female backing singers. In his 60s, Sina Sinayoko is by far the oldest of the three and also plays music associated with Maliís huntersí societies. Singing in a deeply resonant, folk-rich voice, which will probably have someone calling him ëthe African Johnny Cashí, his take is quite different from Coulibalyís more unmediated sound and is accompanied by the gentler tones of the simbi, a MalinkÈ version of the hunterís harp. My personal favourite is Coulibalyís album, but all three can be recommended without reservation.
Nigel Williamson
Various Artists
°GÛzalo! Bugal? Tropical Vol 1
Vampisoul
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Sue Steward
Esma Redzepova featuring Titi Robin
Mon Histoire
Accords CroisÈs
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Redûepovaís signature song is ëDzelem Dzelemí, which was adopted as the anthem of the Roma people in 1971, and by far the best recording of it was made for Networkís Gypsy Queens recording in 1999. Her distinctively gritty voice makes your hair stand on end. By comparison, Gypsy Carpet, the new Network recording, is a little disappointing. There are good songs here, with spectacular playing from her clarinettist Zahir Ramadanov, but they emphasise the over-the-top cabaret element often present in Redûepovaís performances. The band, featuring clarinet, trumpet and accordion, is tight and punchy, driven by lively percussion. Itís probably much closer to her regular performing style with an electronic keyboard on some of the tracks.
My Story is a collaboration with French guitarist and lover of Gypsy music Titi Robin. With Robin playing acoustic guitar and bouzouki, and an absence of keyboard, it gives a more transparent texture to the music. The disc features a collection of songs in Romany and Macedonian that ranges across her career, plus four instrumental tracks. According to the liner notes, she wrote the autobiographical song ëMy Storyí when she was 11, which makes Wayne Rooneyís autobiography seem rather overdue. Redûepovaís speciality is dramatic ballad-like laments, which benefit from the rough edge in her voice, and thereís a good selection here, most notably ëHajiri Ma te Dikeí (Damn you Mother), a song she wrote concerning her aunt, who was sold off at an early age. She usually performs it with a black veil over her head and throws in bitter sobs for good measure. Thereís also a new version of ëDjelem, Djelemí with Robin on guitar, which becomes unusually jaunty in the middle, but doesnít equal the old Network version. My advice is to get My Story, but also to invest in Networkís double album of Gypsy Queens.
Simon Broughton
Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan
In Concert
Delta
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Apart from old favourites such as ëAllah Hooí (Nusrat always began with this number) and ëAli da Malangí, there are two songs I hadnít heard before: ëMere Man ka Rajaí (King of my Heart) is a song in praise of the Sufi saint Baba Farid; and ëThori der Hor Thehr Jaí is a terrific Punjabi song in which Nusrat plays the lover imploring his beloved to stay a while longer because his eyes havenít, as yet, had their fill. Itís beautifully innocent, yet simultaneously wise and seductive. By the time we get to the finale, performers and audience alike seem to have surged to the giddiest high, with a couple of the chorus voices (or is it someone from the audience?) going quite audibly out of tune. Even so, I defy anyone to keep still through ëDam Mast Qalandarí. All in all, this is a most uplifting and timely reminder of the king of qawwali at his zenith.
Jameela Siddiqi





