Beehive

Now here’s a real oddity. Jono Heyes is a New Zealander who apparently lives in a gypsy wagon on the edge of the Bohemia forest in the Czech Republic, where he constructed a special studio to record a set that also includes Czech, French and Swedish musicians, and was engineered and mastered by the great Jerry Boys, who won Grammys for his work with Ali Farka Touré & Toumani Diabaté and Buena Vista offshoot projects. The result is a well-produced but curious album that combines all manner of global styles, played by a seven-piece band that includes fiddle, piano, trumpet and gimbri and with songs in Spanish, English, French and Sanskrit. The best track, ‘Cantar la Guitarra’, is a slinky and tuneful salsa dance tune, sounding like a slowed-down Buena Vista track with a jazz edge and some good piano work. Elsewhere, many of the songs are slow and atmospheric, ranging from melodic and gently charming ‘Land of the Greenstone’, which sounds like an old European folk tune, through to ‘Citoyen’, which veers between Balkan knees-up and chanson-influenced balladry, and the opening ‘Mani’s Eyes’, which mixes growled vocals and wailing fiddles and builds up to a grand, chanting climax. Unfocussed, maybe, but certainly bold.