An international flavour here with Americana pioneers The Handsome Family and Euro Symphonic Pop from German/Danish band, the classy Efterklang. The African continent is represented by Baka Beyond.
1. Efterklang - Piramida,
2. The Handsome Family - Through the Trees,
3. India Arie - Song Versation,
4. Baka Beyond - Ete,
5. DJ Vadim - USSR Repertoire,
6. Jill Scott - Who is Jill Scott?
A clean sweep this week, which is sort of surprising even to myself, as I was really enjoying the new Whitest Boy Alive entry and Kings of Convenience still (but sure they will make re-entries at some point). A change is sometimes enforced somewhat prematurely by other housemates with less staying power!
Efterklang are an amazing Danish band now making some of the greatest pop music out there today. Check out some of their videos on
youtube. They started out a bit more indie and experimental and over the course of half a dozen albums (this one being their most recent) have matured into the consummate band - think Coldplay but with more originality and edge. Also great live, often with an orchestra. They've come a long way since I saw them in a room above a pub in Brighton.
The Handsome Family, and in particular this album, is where it all started for me, in Americana that is. I heard Weightless Again on a sampler album - "we stopped for coffee... in the Redwood Forest" and was hooked. Superb, albeit rather disturbing and bizarre, lyrics - short stories about birds, snow and death...
The giant of Illinois
Died from a blister on his toe
After walking all day through the first winter snow
Throwing bits of stale bread
To the last speckled doves
He never even felt his shoe full of blood
Delirious with pain, his bedroom walls began to glow
And he felt himself soaring up through falling snow
And the sky was a woman's arms
Inspiring album artwork of nature and Through the Trees is this week's cover art, and my record of the week.
I don't know anything about India Arie except she has been championed by the late great
Wayne Dyer. The songs are fairly middle of the road and quite souly and funky but er hem quite middly of the roadie. Neil Young famously said his
Harvest album put him in the middle of the road and afterwards he headed straight for the ditch.
Similarly Jill Scott is pretty new to me but this album sounds very current with laid back soul grooves reminiscent of some new chilled hip hop around at the moment (this CD has some of those annoying phantom tracks inserted at the end to thwart random plays, hence has to go in slot 6 of the magazine).
Talking of laid back you can't get more laid back than DJ Vadim - his average BPMs are so slow they barely register and make DJ Shadow seem like Metallica. I haven't really got into this album yet but his more song based
Soundcatcher is brilliant.
Baka Beyond are a sort of Afro-Celt fusion band. Great live and sound how you'd expect with a bit of African music (specifically drums and guitars), and some Irish fiddly bits. Their best known album is probably
The Meeting Pool but this is pretty similar, probably a bit more authentic to it's roots but less groundbreaking.
