PETE E TOPS MUSICAL WEEK IN LA

Well, this week in free outdoor entertainment- particularly of the world music variety- got off to a bit of a slow start this week. First there was Palenke Soultribe at McArthur Park. Now they’re not half-bad, mind you, and I’ve got an ever-expanding appreciation of electronica, but I’m not sure that an outdoor stage with tia y abuela y mijo is really the place for it. I mean, isn’t electronic groove, trance, whatever, custom-made for four black walls, spinning lights, mindless butt-twitching, and a healthy dose of ‘E’? Just as I was starting to think, ‘at least Nortec Collective has an accordion player,’ well right at that moment, who walks out but Mr. Vallenato himself, adding some Colombian country soul to Palenke’s techno grooves. There IS a God. I have a little bit of a problem watching people play with their computers on stage to begin with, but I can be flexible. Just try to keep it below the fifty percent threshold.

Adonis Puentes at noon in California Plaza was more my speed. Now I’m a great fan of his brother Alex (Cuba) Puentes, but this is something totally different, maybe the reason the two went their separate ways after an earlier collaboration. While Alex moved toward some impeccable pop instincts, while maintaining a Cuban rhythm base, Adonis remained closer to home, staying close to the Cuban son tradition. Interestingly, home for these guys is not actually Cuba, but British Columbia, Canada. But Cuba is the spiritual home, and the last century is the classical era, an era that Adonis recreates as surely as did the Buena Vista Social Club.

Later the same day, on the advice of numerous of my better-heeled contemporaries, I ventured out to see Cecilia Noel at McArthur Park. Once again, there seemed to be a problem of ‘place’. Is a public park really the place to see a Las Vegas-style act, especially one that features at its head a Latina ‘firecracker’? Isn’t that act a little out-of-date anyway? I mean, Charro may or may not still be alive (I’d need a doctor’s opionion to be sure), but surely with all the Madonnas and Gagas that have have come and gone in the last fifty years, you’d think we’d’ve moved on to another phase by now… not that her show’s no good, mind you. Her band’s killer, in fact, would have to be for Jimmie Kimmel to steal half of it for his own purposes, don’t you reckon? And Cecilia can still do a high-kick with the best of the Las Vegas chorus line… but still…

By all logic, Saturday should have been the payoff- given the law of large numbers and all- but… well… I was really looking forward to the show down at the Cal Plaza water court, to be divided between Nonstop Bhangra and Pacha Massive, but figured I might as well stop off at McArthur Park alolng the way, since it’s on the same Metro red line, so I can use the same ticket. I’ll only have a half hour there at most, so if the cops tell me that’s ‘two rides/two tickets’ I’ll just tell them I got off at the wrong stop, so need to continue on. Hey, I know it’s only a buck and a half, but there’s a principle involved here! The group playing was ‘Monte Negro’, variously credited with ‘rock/reggae/new wave/ska’ but which in reality is just some pretty decent ‘indie en espanol’ (mostly). I only had a few minutes if I wanted to make the start of the Cal Plaza show…

I probably should have stayed, but I’d been wanting to hear Bhangra music ever since I lived in Hounslow west of London (me and a lot of ex-pat sub-continentals) and saw it on all the flyers there every weekend, but… never got around to actually going to any shows. I was disappointed… but of course I really didn’t know what to expect. I’m still not sure if I got the ‘real thing’ or not, but somehow I don’t think a rapper should be coming out every other song to talk that shit... but you never know… The dance numbers were nice, though, even though there were vocals with no singers, i.e. pre-recorded. I left early, figuring to catch the Tubes down at Pershing Square between sets. I finally gave up after 15-20 minutes of waiting, figuring they’d only finally come up and do a quick run-through of their big hits, most of which I wouldn’t even know… So I rushed back to the water court, so’s not to miss Pacha Massive, who I’d heard OF… but never really heard… ho hum… maybe I should keep as a joke my little play on their name, Macha Passive. They make Aterciopelados look- and sound- like Nirvana, sleeeepyyyyyy… good rainy day stuff, pour a little brandy… maybe call up Michael Jackson’s doctor…

Then there’s Pete E, Escovedo that is, and a family that seems to know no bounds. Those guys not only rocked Hollywood & Highland last night, but made it memorable, including a visit by daughter Sheila E sitting in, plus numerous other members of the extended family. Pete and his brother Coke were as much a part of the original Santana sound as was Sr. Carlos himself, and Pete has gone on to become one of the grand masters of Latin jazz, an emerging genre that seems to have energized and stabilized the larger genre of jazz itself, saving it from the icky thump of too much white-boy ‘fusion’, to which jazz over-corrected after the excesses of be-bop. Jazz audiences are the best, too, the most complete mix of black white Latin Asian you’ll ever find. It saved the week for me.

This week is full of a bunch of unknowns- for me at least- so that’s good, as I like to keep it fresh. Adonis Puentes and Pistolera- both great- will be at LACMA and McArthur Park respectively, but I’ve seen both, so will likely be elsewhere. Since Madagascar is one of my favorite places in the world (watch your pockets!), I’ll definitely go check out Razia Said, one of its rising stars. Other than that, it’s pot luck and homework… that’s what MySpace is for. Some people like to rib it because of its second-ran status as a social network, but it’s maybe the single largest database of popular music in the world. There’s at least SOMETHING by almost everyone there. So maybe I’ll see you... somewhere in the golden triangle?

JAZZ, SUPER STRINGS, & LA SEMANA PERUANA

Well, things got off to a shaky start last Thursday when I found out that the group I was expecting to see and hear- ‘Palenke Soultribe’- is not scheduled until next week, so I got ‘Inca’ instead, an Andean folklore group. Chalk it up to dim lighting in my kitchen, jet lag, and the vicissitudes of fate. Anyway, that’s probably good, since I can probably think of plenty of things to say about Andean music, given my philosophy degree and many moons spent in Peru and Bolivia. Andean music, in fact, is maybe one of the few groups that can lay claim to a pre-reggae presence as a recognized world music genre, given Paul Simon’s adoption of ‘El Condor Pasa’ as his own, an event that pre-dated ‘Mother and Child Reunion’ by a shot and ‘Diamonds on the Soles’ by a mile. He couldn’t get it away with it now… now that Andean music has long been available in almost any Manhattan subway station- playing for tips- and the poor beggars are now reduced to dressing up in buckskin and beads and Sioux war bonnets, playing New Age music on the streets of Barcelona and Prague and… Ljubljana, any place where a there might be a tourist to buy the act, and the CD. And to think that not so long ago many good Andean groups could fill a decent-size arena in even modest-sized towns in the US. Maybe it’s time for their second wind. Though traditional penas may be on the decline in South America itself, Andean musicians have long been finding places in modern fusion-style jazz bands, with generally good results. Much of the the traditional stuff is musically not so challenging, after all, and plenty repetitious. They don’t create new traditions every day.

The LA-based band ‘Inca’ is maintaining traditions, though, but doing it right, mixing traditional dance in, and not limiting their offerings to the highland traditions. Anything ‘Afro’ is a good bet on the world music charts these days, and that includes Afro-Peruvian, whose contributions always outweighed their numbers. Ciro Hurtado, at LACMA Saturday evening, is more my speed, though. This is some of the best modern jazz on anybody’s favorite ‘triple-z’ station, and with a pronounced Andean twist, it goes down real nicely. This is one of the world’s best guitarists on nylon strings, and understatement IS his statement. Sr. Hurtado defines the modern ‘Latino sound’ almost as much as Carlos Santana once did, but he accomplishes it in negative space, a reverse applique’ tapestry. Imagine one of Santana’s rare quiet moments and that’s where Hurtado punches it up, most of the time laboring away unobtrusively in the background, weaving a rich sonic landscape.

Grant Geissman was there at LACMA the night before as part of their Fri-Sat 1-2 jazz-Latino punch (I’ll have a cup of that, please) in what is fast becoming one of the city’s best free offerings. It’s a chill scene, too, families and picnics on the grass. Grand Performances downtown may have just as good a selection of DIY food, but LACMA has more dogs, if you’re a closet dog-whisperer or even just a casual dog-watcher (and kids are welcome and plentiful in the early eves). MacArthur Park has got the best pupusas, though, and some good music, too. In addition to the aforementioned ‘Inca’, and Ricardo Lemvo’s ‘Makina Loca’- which I’d already foregone- ‘String Theory’ was there Saturday evening, with some of the week’s more interesting sounds. Imagine steel strings stretched 100 feet across the Park’s lawn radiating from a harp-like point on stage. Add some guitar and bass and cello and plenty of percussion and you’ve got some novel frequencies, albeit mostly of the minor key, twangy-bent-string variety.

In what has to be one of the music season’s more bizarre coincidences, Saturday was also ‘string night’ at Cal Plaza downtown, but it took on a totally different dimension. Starting off with ‘Hiroshima’s June Kuramoto giving a virtuoso performance on the Japanese koto- accompanied by piano- the show went to Veracruz for the next set, with Conjunto Hueyapan and one of the best version’s of ‘La Bamba’ you’d ever want to hear, even if they DID leave out the ‘para subir al cielo’ verse (I won’t mention para ser secretaria). But the real treat came when the troupe’s youngest member, the lovely Ixya Herrera came in to take over vocal chores. That woman has got some pipes! And as the name suggests, she and they celebrate la raza’s indigenous background- in addition to the Spanish. Depending on how she decides to market herself at this point, I feel like I’ve just had a sneak preview of Lila Down’s successor. Prince Diabate’ closed out the evening on his griot’s African kora, but as the evening was already long, and I'd already seen and heard him, I decide to forego and go before. That’s three venues and five bands in as many hours in the Hollywood/mid-Wilshire/downtown circuit that I call my ‘Golden Triangle.’

Actually first- but not least- was ‘Bad Haggis’ (don’t ask what ‘haggis’ is) at the LA Farmer’s Market, a kind of Irish-folk-fusion group (no, U2 does not count as Irish folk). As always it’s novelty that sells (ask any businessman) and music is no different. Of course ‘Salsa Celtica’ has already been done- by a group of that very name, but whereas that’s mostly salsa with Celtic elements, this is just the opposite, i.e if you want to hear bagpipes, this is a better bet. Idon’t know how it’d play in the bars and pubs of Kilkenny, but it sounds pretty good at the LA Farmers Market… and that’s not the greatest venue for acoustics.

This week best bets are looking like the aforementioned Palenke Soultribe at MacArthur on Thursday, Natacha Atlas the same night out in the hills at Skirball, and Adonis Puentes and Pacha Massive (NOT ‘Macha Passive’, no) at Cal Plaza Friday noon and Saturday evening respectively. Of course that same evening not only will Nonstop Bhangra be playing the second set at the water court, but the Tubes (yes, THOSE Tubes!) will be right down the street at Pershing Square. Of course this is a world music blog, so I might just have to, you know… sneak over and catch a quick listen during break. Yes, I’m a closet punk/hippie/folkie/emo, guilty as charged. So sue me.

WORLD MUSIC HEATS UP LA- Beat the Donkey, Wil-Dog, and Tommy Castro

Ahhh! It’s that time of year again, like it or not. Last week the temps were up to almost three figures Fahrenheit and the blood so thin that I could barely get a quorum. The windows stay open and blankets go unused. The fan follows me around the apartment- which involves frequent trips to the fridge- and I have air-conditioned dreams, if I can sleep at all. Fast forward a few days and that’s all changed, reminding me of what I like most about LA- the weather. If it’s too hot one day, it just might be too cool the next, averaging out really nicely, nothing normal mind you, ‘average’. If it’s too hot for me today, it’ll probably be too cold for my wife- she’s Thai- tomorrow. But I was lying. That’s not my favorite thing about LA. My favorite thing is the music- and lots of it- outdoors and free all summer. It’s that time of year again. The weather’s better at Lake Atitlan in Guatemala anyway BTW.

I went to Brazil a few years ago- to travel, see Carnaval… and listen to music. “Well, you must’ve heard some pretty good stuff,” a friend surmised upon my return. “Well, you know, it’s funny…,” and I’m not sure if I ever completed the sentence or not. Because, well, to be honest, Brazilian music CAN be funny. That’s part of the package, and part of the personality. The idea promoted by bossa nova and Ipanema and a Jobim or two that Brazil is all about sex, show, and suavedade is a bit misleading, or specific to maybe only a part of Rio, but hardly the whole package, or even the real package, as if Brazil were but Cannes or Nice projected in Sensurround® upon the Atlantic coast of South America as a whole. Now that might be nice, but it’s just not accurate. In Recife, they don’t even do samba, much less bossa nova. In Recife, they dance frevo, which is something like a jitterbug cucaracha. And the music, well… I was disappointed at the time, but I think I’m starting to ‘get it’…

Nobody better personifies the wackiness that Brazilian popular music is capable of than ‘Cyro Baptista and Beat the Donkey’, who played last Saturday night at California Plaza in downtown LA. They don’t beat around the bush… or maybe they do. Better described as a troupe than a group, they take the stage wearing tophats and Indian headdresses and Russian ushankas and proceed to play flip-flops and PVC pipes- in addition to the usual guitars and drums- while tap-dancing and Balinese-dancing… and prancing about the stage in general. Sound like a bit much, maybe? That’s what I was thinking, too… and then they broke into a version of ‘Immigrant Song’ by Led Zeppelin. Hmmm… I’m thinking… that’s different… still thinking… ‘Immigrant Song’? Now that’s radical! I never particularly even liked that song… until now, that is. And they played it well, too, note-perfect (lead guitarist kicks ass btw). Oh, now I get it! Cyro Baptista… beats your ass (with tongue planted firmly in cheek)! I’d listen again…

Compare and contrast with Wil-Dog (Abers, Ozomatli bassist) y su banda. Like Cyro and the ass-beaters, these guys can play, too. But once again, there’s an element of kitsch that clings to it all, too. I’m just not sure if they intend it that way. This is a large band, full of brass- including tuba- and balls, and cutting-up Ozomatli-style while playing music that I could only describe as… ‘Mexican’? True, they run around the stage less than OZO, and their music stays more within a single genre, whatever genre that is. Maraiachi, maybe? Polka? I give up. Wil-Dog himself seems to be having mucho fun, though, prancing around the stage all dressed up muy Pachuco, and his voice isn’t half-bad, but… you might want to keep that day job, Wil-Dog. It ain’t bad, either…

The other act I saw this past week was Tommy Castro’s band last night (Tues.) at Hollywood & Highland’s Wine & Jazz series. This music isn’t exactly jazz, of course, but I guess blues ‘passes’ like black for white. I’ve heard of this band for years in the Bay Area, so it’s nice to finally see- and hear- them. They’re pretty good, too, about as good as blues can be, really, considering that nothing new has been done with it for at least several decades, since Stevie Ray, if not Duane A. Blues just isn’t as revolutionary as it used to be in the 60’s, like going to the other side of town and entering a new dimension, and one that rocked, to boot. Even Cajun music has re-invented itself, fer Chrissaskes, and traditional Andean music is now Andes ‘fusion’. I’ll be the first to line up for the ‘new blues’. Bring it on!

So by now I should have launched into a bit on KCRW’s ‘World Festival’, right? Wrong, for whatever the ‘world festival’ IS, it’s NOT- in any reliable dependable way- world music, i.e. music from other countries, cultures and languages, two out of three wears the badge. Now while we intellectual cognescenti intelligentsia all know- nod nod wink wink- that ALL music is ‘world music’, that doesn’t help the poor bloke who might seriously be interested if he knew what it was. I’ll tell you what it’s NOT. It’s NOT ‘She & Him’ (or He & Her, I can’t remember, only that it was mixed nominative/accusative). Now Zooey Deschanel is not bad… pretty good, actually, so I’ll be interested to see if she is the one actor/actress who can actually accomplish something as a musician. As of yet, it’s only been the other way around, musicians finding success as actors. Money’s probably better that way.

Three gigs a week, you think that’s a lotta listening? When I’m up and running at full speed, I can do that in one evening. I’m still only half-counscious, recovering from eighty countries and two years of jet-lag! Top picks for this week include jazz greats Bill Watrous at the Farmer’s Market Thursday night and Grant Geissman at LACMA on Friday. Ciro Hurtado also shows up at LACMA on Saturday. Then there’s Colombian vallenato with VBC at Pasadena Levitt Pavillion on Friday after a night of Afro-Colombian with Palenke Soultribe at Levitt MacArthur on Thursday. Then there’s my favorite venue, the California water court downtown with shows Friday noon and Friday and Saturday evening. It doesn’t matter who’s playing. They’re always good; it comes with the turf. They’ve even got the funicular ‘Angels Flight’ up and running for the first time in years, whisk you right up to the music from Pershing Square metro station for a quarter. Try and beat that. See you there.

MAGNIFICATION by MAGNIFICO- Hawaiian Surfing Spaghetti Western Balkan Music

Most Americans had probably never heard of Slovenia until the US soccer team came up against them head to head in recent World Cup play. And while most probably could identify it as one of the now-divorced Balkan states of the former Yugoslavia, any more info than that would probably require some serious head-scratching. Slovenia was in fact the first Balkan country out of the gate, long heavily influenced by Austria and especially Italy, which all converge in and around the now-Italian city of Trieste. When the Iron Curtain started showing some serious rusty spots, Slovenia wasted no time in declaring its intentions. Outside the main Serbo-Croatian core of the southern Slav region, Belgrade didn’t even protest. Since then Slovenia has moved into close alliance with Western Europe, and is firmly on the main tourist trail as an easy inclusion on any Italian or Austrian itinerary, something like post-communist ‘lite’. In fact Ljubljana is one of the coolest and most beautiful cities of the region, no exaggeration necessary.

Musically I’ve never been too strongly attracted to Balkan music, perhaps because of a lack of exposure to tuba bands in my childhood. I keep listening, though, figuring that sooner or later something would strike my fancy. Magnifico may just be it. Something of a mix between Manu Chao, surf music, spaghetti Westerns, and traditional Balkan brass, Magnifico is probably best understood as something of a South Slavic answer to Mumiy Troll or Gogol Bordello. It wasn’t easy being a young Communist growing up in the grips of the Kremlin, you know, and even though Yugoslavia was independent, the psychology is common to all of them, and even to Cubans and North Koreans to this day. You learn to adapt. You learn to suppress your emotions. You learn to do end runs around your own imagination. You go a little bit crazy. The internal security police exist like a gray pall over your entire life, and Las Vegas looms like a dream from heaven all out of proportion to the reality. When you finally break loose, you hardly know where to start in making up for lost time. This is the world into which Robert Pesut, aka ‘Magnifico’, emerged, full of iron and irony, both music and words, tongue planted firmly in cheek.

He’s got a new album out, too, called ‘Magnification.’ ‘Zum Zum’ starts off like a raucous Balkan gypsy rag, doing a parody of ‘Ten Little Indians’ al la Europe with gypsies giving the lie to modern Europe liberalism. ‘iThink’ ups the intellectual ante a notch- albeit in similar musical fashion- “iThink and I got an idea that, there is too much, too much nation, too much nation for liberation and too much nation, for one railway station.” ‘Bosangero Nero’ slows things down a bit and goes into ‘spaghettti western’ mode to great effect as our poor hero tries to explain to police that ‘I don’t know much about no globalization, I’m just a Bosangero.’ The effect is completed with cha-cha-cha ending. ‘Ubicu Te’ goes into full-scale Balkan brass and is the first song to be sung entirely in Slovenian… and with electronic flourishes. The parody and paradox continue unabated regardless of language, “There is no place where you can hide, someday you will be my bride. And if I got to kill, kill baby I will, if I got to kill you honey trust on me I will.” Yes, Magnifico has a strong psycho-sexual side to his tongue-in-cheek, which ‘Emily’ explores further, “Emily, Emily after midnight come to me, I wanna see you dancing just for me Emily.” ‘Pismu Kumu (Rambo Rambo)’, also sung in Slovenian, adds some Hawaiian-style guitar and some reggae–style beat to the musical mix and some serious religious doubt to the philosophical mix, “Oh, Rambo, Rambo,… I thought there was a heavenly God, to tell me some things I know nothing about, But neither has he spoken to me, nor he knows to tell me anything, it seems to me he’s just a big hoax.” Hmm, maybe Communism wasn’t so bad, after all.

‘Avanti Popolo’ is the only song to be sung in Italian, though hardly an ‘Italian’ song, and ‘Giv Mi Mani 2’ shows the influence of English language- and hiphop- on modern Slovenian music, though neither song is much more than mid-album filler. “I’m clever I’m not a fool, I got TV and I know what is cool, Sex and drugs and rock’n’roll, Satisfy my body and soul” may be a genuine expression of existential dilemma, but ends up sounding more contrived than inspired. ‘Did You (Did U)’ fares better. Self-deprecating and ironic, the lyrics actually manage to explore some little-discussed territory of the human psyche, and does it with horns and electronica in the background, “I don’t care if you look at my lady, no problem it’s ok with me.” That takes guts. ‘Ljuba’ adds another wonderful ‘spaghetti western’ feel overlaid by Slovenian lyrics, while ‘Amore’ carries the Italian feel to its locial conclusion. “There is something up above, some people call it love, some people call it love, and I feel amore, yes I feel amore.” ‘Hidee Hi Hidee Ho’ is something of a Balkan war march, compelling enough, but ‘The Land Of Champions’ alone is worth the price of admission. This is no less than a Balkan ‘House of the Rising Sun’, boogie-woogie surf style, ‘Oh mother, tell your children not to do what I have done, I've lost my soul, oh glory hallelujah, down in Yugoslavia.’ Who’d’ve though to rhyme hallelujah with Yugoslavia? He’s Robert Persut and he calls himself ‘Magnico’. The album is ‘Magnification.’ Cute, ey? Check it out.

LAYA PROJECT- SIX COUNTRIES, THREE RELIGIONS, ONE OCEAN + ONE DISASTER = WHOLE LOTTA MUSIC

Even before the Boxing Day Tsunami hit the Indian Ocean in 2004 I knew something was wrong. I was lying in bed enjoying the moment in my house up near the Golden Triangle in Thailand. We had just moved into a larger house, you see, and so our bedroom was now on the second floor, balcony and all, ‘room with a view’ you might say. Suddenly a rumbling below shook me out of my reverie.

“That was an earthquake,” I told my wife.
“That’s not possible. Thailand doesn’t have earthquakes.”

‘They do now, either that or this house is falling down,” not an impossibility given the shoddy construction techniques that are commonplace in the Kingdom.

Assuming that people down South also felt the same quake- much stronger there than the measly 2.2 Richter rumble where I was- they should have been running for their lives… uphill. Because at that point there was still time to save oneself from the tsunami. No percussion wave can outrun the speed of sound, you see, but a fast jet can. I bet they will do just that next time, run for their lives.

By the time I turned on my TV an hour later it was too late. The wave had hit hard and the first reports were coming in. Phuket got blasted. Of course at that point even THEN there was still time for southern Indians to get out of harm’s way, since it would take several hours for a wave to travel that distance. Aceh on Sumatra in Indonesia was already history, of course, they Indonesia’s strictest of Muslims- and not coincidentally most westerly community- the first to go under the wave, something from which they have yet to fully recover. And the aftermath was brutal, some 230,000 killed, the worst affected countries being Indonesia, Sri Lanka, India, and Thailand, in that order. Stronger earthquakes have been recorded, and stronger tsunamis, too, but none have wreaked more havoc on human populations. Though Thailand received much of the associated press (and aid), its death toll was relatively minor. But here’s the difference: its death toll was largely tourist, i.e. rich foreigners.

Fresh flowers love fresh ashes, of course, and good things can come out of the worst disasters. One of these was the Laya Project by EarthSync, a production company based in South India. Originally conceived as a world music ‘documentary’ of the disaster and the response to it, what resulted was a Baraka-like work of filmic art that tells stories with pictures, and consciously omits tear-jerking tabloid shots in favor of life-affirming images that refer to an open-ended future rather than a painfully punctured past. And it not only comes with soundtrack, in fact the soundtrack IS the film, or at least central to it. What better way to affirm life than through music? And ‘re-mixers’ have finally found their calling here, too. Thanks to Yotam Agam and Patrick Sebag, the original music has been respectfully enhanced for a quality listening experience, not butchered for the ‘mash-up’ tastes of surfers and tubers who spend more time interacting with a screen than they do with real life.

If these songs of six countries seem to evoke the Indian tradition over all others, there’s a reason for that, too. The Indian tradition pre-dates all other civilized and civilizing traditions in the region. Sanskrit is to the Thai language- and others- what Latin is to western languages. To this day the Indo-Malay ‘bahasas’ owe more of their vocabulary to ancient Sanskrit than they do to the Arabic of the Arabs to whom they owe their religion and cultural existence. But in spite of this common ancestral base, modern countries of the region are largely fragmented and even hostile to one another, religious fundamentals lost in the rush to fundamentalism, all in response to the overwhelming sweep of history.

And while the genetic roots of the region may be as diverse as East and West can be, the cultural nexus is similar, and these are the systems by which we operate. Both sides of the Indian ocean are a microcosm of this subconscious divide, Indo-Aryans on the sub-continent divided into Hindus and Muslims, Austro-Asians in the Southeast divided into Buddhists and Muslims, the result of historical and religious forces at work, social caste and godhead, one or many, face or faceless. When disaster strikes, many of these artificial divisions and unanswerable questions fade away. The Muslim scholars and the Buddhist priest chant together, and all parents are looking for their sons and daughters, and a return to a better life.

This is an area largely overlooked by Putumayo’s ‘groove & chill’ approach to world music. It’s not up to local traditions to adapt to our modern Western tastes; it’s up to us to adapt to theirs, or at least accept and appreciate them. If ethnomusicologists and ‘re-mixers’ can help this process along, then more power to them. What Earth Sync has accomplished here is no better or worse than what other unsung heroes have done elsewhere, not the least of which include companies like Sublime Frequencies and people like Laurent Jeanneau, scrounging the world’s outback for scraps of music that are as important as mitochondrial DNA in deciphering who we are and where we came from.

I’ve been to WOMADS and WOMEXES and music festivals all over the world, but nothing surpasses the night at the Sapa ‘love market’ in north Vietnam some fifteen years ago when I listened to two tribal Red Dzao lovers singing their hearts out- literally and antiphonally- getting the words and the rhythm just right… before the big plunge, before the tides of history make them forget. Speaking of tides, check out the Laya Project when you can, both film and music. It’ll do you good.

FEUFOLLET’s En Couleurs- Cajun Indie? Mais oui…

Anybody who thinks that zydeco is what Cajun music is all about is missing the boat, literally, the boats that brought settlers expelled by jolly ol’ Brits down south to the lower Mississippi River delta a couple centuries ago, where they mixed with Natives and Africans and whoever else decided to jump ship before anyone else either noticed or cared. Zydeco may indeed be the beans of southern Louisiana music, but Cajun folk music is the rice. Situated at the crossroads of New Orleans funk and Austin country, Delta blues and Tex-Mex, uh… tex-mex, you might expect a variety of influences from the mix of influences in southern Louisiana, especially in a cool town like Lafayette. You got it...

So where does this group of young kids with a band called ‘Feufollet’ fit into the mix of hard-drinking and hard-partying bon temps gumbo musique? I’d say somewhere between the heart and the head. This ain’t zydeco. This music is closer to French ballads- themselves not too far removed from English ballads- with heavy doses of other influences, all subsumed to treatment by the traditional Cajun instruments of fiddle and accordion. Thus it’s more lyric-based with less boogie… but you can still dance to it, though maybe a bit slower sometimes.

‘Au Fond du Lac’ is a slow haunting gypsy-like number that leads off the album, with Scarlet Rivera-like fiddle and female vocals to match. ‘Des Promesses’, with its guitar and organ grand orchestral introduction quickly advises us to not get complacent yet; even greater things are yet in store. It then breaks into a rollicking rocker- complete with male vocals and traditional fiddle and accordion- that doesn’t slow down until the final note is played. ‘La Berceuse du Vieux Voyageur (The Old Traveler’s Lullabye)’ is just that, with slow soulful female vocals to match. ‘Si T'as Fini’ adds some kick-ass guitar to the mix as male and female alternate songs and viewpooints, the female-vocal songs slower and sadder, the male-vocal songs more lively and danceable, as if these roles had been handed down and honed as such for generations.

After a brief ‘Do Wah Interlude’, male and female finally join forces in a duet, in what may be the album’s finest moment, ‘Ouvre la Porte (Open the Door)’ is a tearful ballad ‘about a woman dying of an illness as her faithful lover calls for the doctor and bids a sorrowful farewell.’ ‘Assis Dans la Fenetre Interlude’ follows with an almost Celtic-like chant with female vocals only, a long ‘good-bye forever’. ‘Les Jours Sont Longs (The Days are Long)’ is the first song to add a pronounced country feel to the album, almost country-pop, with pedal steel guitar solo breaking up the twangy male vocals and traditional fiddle, complete with stinger on the end. ‘Cowboy Waltz’ is the female counterpart, with banjo and accordion- and bells- as they continue the male-female back-and-forth in an almost-too-perfect symmetry. ‘Jean Billaudeaux’ is an instrumental doodle that serves as little more than another interlude- in an album full of them- before continuing with the male-side boogie of ‘Je M'en Va’ and ‘Mon Tour’ , followed by ‘Ouvre la Porte Interlude’, another instrumental- this one acoustic- something of a ‘Cajun remix’ of the earlier duet I suppose.

‘En Movement’ is another light-rocker in a string of them that has little by little come to define the album, and the ‘Lomax Interlude’- with ethnomusicologist Alan Lomax pontificating over the debris of last night’s fais do-do- doing little to change that. This music may have indeed derived from the generations of what came before, but with a difference. While all the best-known Louisiana groups have converted to almost-English-only lyrics as fast as they can, Feufollet sings only in Cajun French, even though neither of the vocalists has a French surname. This is Cajun music for a new generation, better educated and open to new influences, expanding ever outward while refining and defining the central core… the still-beating heart. That’s what’s been handed down over the years. It’s called En Couleurs by Feufollet. Hardie K says… you know what.

'82' by 'Just a Band'- Ethereal Soulful Hip Hop Trance?

It was bound to happen... and it IS happening... little by little. The new cultural democracy fostered by the likes of MySpace, FaceBook, and YouTube is slowly bearing fruit... which is no surprise. When record companies crumble, after all, something will rise in its place, likely something very similar to what precipitated the crash in the first place. Flowers love ashes. What IS surprising, though, is that that democracy is crossing borders, to the unmediated delight of all of us who care about successful cultural syntheses. Maybe there IS some hope for our fragile planet of excitable primates after all.

So forget the band's lame name (btw I do offer a band-naming service at very reasonable rates). Forget the Shaft-like tough guy 'Makmende' ('make my day') viral video bad-acting mock-movie-trailer showcase for their song 'Ha He' that rocketed off the U-tube charts... consider the short-attention-span source. Forget the PR rap about how these guys deserve a scoring handicap since Kenya has power blackouts three days a week. That's pure, uh... exaggeration. Sure the power goes out once in a while, but nothing compared to Ethiopia... or even Tanzania. Kenya's pretty civilized... by sub-Sahara African standards at least.

Let's just consider the music. The pop music world is currently 'populated' (pun intended) by many diverse genres that seem to have little to do with one another, with even the best of it somehow lacking in something... something important... something unexplainable. But taken as a whole pop music is incredibly rich and diverse, an incredible story of cultural evolution over the last fifty years, if not longer. The history of the music by American blacks is more clear and concise, from gospel to blues to soul to hiphop, a tale of cultural self-discovery that has yet to reach its final chapter. And now a quantum leap has occurred, a leap across borders.

If combination is the essence of creativity, then that is exactly what 'Just a Band' has accomplished with '82'- the year band members Blinky, Dan and Jim were all born btw. The album opens with “Save My Soul”, an ethereal trance-like chant with its roots in pure gospel- 'you're gonna save my soul...I've been inside too long... you're gonna take me home'. Many Westerners might be surprised at the influence of gospel music in Africa and especially the African diaspora in the Caribbean, such it usually rates no street cred behind such trendy catchwords like Afro-Pop, Afro-Beat, etc., but the influence is there and strong. “Ha-He” is the funky epic rocker that inspired the 'Makmende' story, a killer tune, though the lyrics are incomprehensible except for a few references to 'defying gravity', no big deal for a Clint Eastwood-inspired superhero. “Extra” completes the killer trilogy, a playful childlike hip-hop that shows a wonderful sarcastic edge to their streetwise intellect- 'I wanna' be darker... thinner... better... cooler... wiser...'. These guys are wise beyond their circumstances, and their English is good, giving us a rare insightful look into the mindset of young modern- and most importantly intelligent- Africans.

“Kaa Ridho” is a song sung in Swahili, a kind of afro-rap, with some nice piano, while “Migingo Express”, also in Swahili, is more Afro-pop, with some Dylanesque harp, but the album is bogging down a bit at this point. “Usinibore” brings it right back with some trancey 'tronic existential chanting- 'Just because I'm an African with black skin... don't tell me what I can and can't do... I can change the world'. “Sunrise” continues in the same vein – yes, THAT vein- hypnotic, conga-laced afro-trance- 'all I want is to see your face changing... sun rising', but that's as close as the band gets to a love song. “Huff + Puff” is a bouncy electronic number with a catchy disco beat, and “Uko Mbele” plays for some commercial cache with lyrics like 'can I walk in the rain with you?', but the album has pretty much shot its wad by this point. The black-eyed phea-male vocals on the next two songs- “Forever People(Do It So Delicious)” and “Stay”- are good enough, but don 't really move the album forward, just philler. Ditto “BoogieDeeBweet”, an an electronic instrumental afterthought. That's the beauty of laptop listening- delete buttons.

This band's meat-and-potatoes (or chicken masala maybe?) is their successful combination of electronica and hiphop. The icing on the cake is their street-wise intellectuality that goes way beyond the boring pidgin poop that's become the norm for foreign bands... or hiphop, either, for that matter. Electronica needs an edge. Hiphop needs some smarts. Neither needs so much 'tude. These guys pull it off. That's '82' by JAB ('Just a Band'). Hardie K says check it out.

ROCKY DAWUNI’s` ‘Hymns for the Rebel Soul’- THE FUTURE OF REGGAE?

Okay, so I’m wrong sometimes. Not good enough? Okay, so I’m wrong lots of times. Still not good enough? Mea culpa mea culpa mea culpa mea culpa hari Krishna hari Krishna hari rama hari hari… just kidding. But what happened is that Rocky Dawuni played at the California Plaza water court in LA last year, and- not being familiar with his music beforehand- I was put off by his flying locks and macho strut, like God’s self-appointed peacock come to give form and color (and pheromones) to an otherwise murky muddy black-and-white world. We the lockless ones can be like that sometimes. We’ve got pheromones, too (in all fairness, I can be even harsher on beautiful women pretending to be accomplished artists). So, unimpressed with the first song or two, I left in a huff, assuming the man was more strut than strum. I then proceeded to skewer the man in this little musical blog I do. Fortunately I listened to his MySpace offerings before publishing, which- especially the song ‘In Ghana’- were pretty damn good. I stood corrected.

There is a point to be made, though- music with a message risks losing that message if it becomes too obscured behind flashy showmanship. And reggae is nothing if not music with a message, whether religion, politics, marijuana, or... some combination. Too often since Bob Marley’s death this all gets packaged up into some sort of self-styled smoke-enlightened messiah complex which pretends to know answers to all life’s mysteries- including questions not even asked yet- that bends dangerously close to conspiracy theory’s know-it-all younger brother. The themes get too heavy sometimes, and the music gets lost. The trick is to wrap up heavy themes in small sweet packages, like the proverbial spoonful of sugar. Musicians should stick to what they know best, also. We’re all in trouble when we start getting our politics from celebrities like singers and actors and comedians and… hey, wait a minute…

So now I’m thoroughly chastised, because rocky Dawuni’s new album- ‘Hymns for the Rebel Soul’- is killer. Dawuni stakes out his turf right away with ‘Download the Revolution,’ a slightly ‘tron number that updates Gil Scott-Heron’s observation/dictate ‘the revolution will be televised.’ With lyrics like ‘conscious music revolution… to wipe away musical pollution’ you get the idea. Next, ‘African Reggae Fever’ is a self-congratulatory little dittie, with a nice gospel-like opening, that serves to advance Dawuni’s mission to unite Africa in some sort of reggae-inspired cosmic consciousness. ‘Extraordinary Woman’ then gets into the heart of the album, literally, pure love song, pure hit material. ‘When I first saw you in that crowd, sweet emotion swept throught my soul’… sounds like love to me. Maybe the album’s best song- ‘Walls Tumbling Down’- sits right in clean-up position in the batting order. Here Dawuni accomplishes the difficult task of sliding a political message in with irresistible licks, and does it with a master’s touch- “me again… knocking on your door… till all your walls come tumbling down… me again, like Jericho before.. Babylon walls come tumbling down”, speaking for all the little people who’ve demanded justice and had to wait in line until ‘the time is right.’ After that ‘Master Plan’ is a nice change of pace, complete with bird calls and some really nice brass, albeit with a message slightly muddy.

At this point the album’s a hit regardless of what Dawuni wants to do. He could hum nursery rhymes for the next fifteen minutes, and it’d still be a great album. But he keeps laying down more grooves as if it were effortless. ‘Road to Destiny’- “never give up hope… on the road to destiny”… this is good stuff. Dawuni shows maturity and social responsibility with ‘Take It Slow (Love Love Love)’- “listen to my music before you go”, notable in a continent where AIDS is the leading cause of death and machismo is slow to tolerate affronts to its dignity. ‘Jerusalem’ even pays tribute to the Jewish culture’s massive contributions to our modern world with a melody that sounds a lot like Manu Chao (clan destino, maybe?) and echoes Bob’s ‘Lion in Zion’, even going so far as to hypothesize that Israel’s problems are due largely to jealousy: ‘though you sit in isolation… you are the whole world’s inspiration.’ It’s a sign of political maturity to stake out an unpopular position, especially in an Africa that is increasingly Muslim… and for good reason.

Reggae is an important moral force in the African diaspora, and that means a lot here on the ground in Ghana (I like to travel to the countries I’m reviewing to get a better feel of it). It’s no accident that it emerged from the trenchtowns of Kingston, the one city in the Caribbean that can easily rival Africa’s biggest and baddest. In a continent where the most developed country- South Africa- is arguably the most socially horrific, answers don’t come easy. Street crime is out of control at almost unimaginable levels in the very countries where AIDS runs rampant concurrently with political corruption. With the exception of Islam, there are few moral compasses to be had… except for Rastafarianism… and reggae music. Rocky Dawuni does not shirk from his social duties here, and he does it with licks and chops that rival the best of them. The album indeed is more about social responsibility than rebelliousness, which is overrated anyway IMHO. If there’s any justice in the world, this will be Rocky’s breakthrough album. Simply said, it’s probably the best reggae album I’ve heard since you-know-who. Hardie K says check it out.

DALAI LAMA RENAISSANCE- RELIGION HAS A ROCK STAR (WITH SOUNDTRACK)

Okay, so the Dalai Lama may not be the prophet Jesus was, but he plays on a much wider stage, and in real time, and he speaks English. So he’s about the best we’ve got, the one person in the world who can be looked up to for moral authority, in a world that needs nothing so much as moral authority. While Roman Catholics and Thai Buddhists are embroiled in sex scandals that can no longer be explained away with a shrug of the shoulders and a “comes with the turf” attitude… and fundamentalist Muslim mullahs and imams tempt the gullible to travel heavenward by a shortcut that includes self-annihilation… and equally fundamentalist US Southern Baptists and Mormons mix their religion and politics instead of mixing their drinks… and Jewish leaders give the nod to Israeli aggression… it’s nice to know that someone- at least one major religious leader in the world- is quietly concentrating on the business at hand… individual happiness.

For those religious skeptics out there, the process by which the Dalai Lama is chosen/non-chosen must be as exasperating as religion itself. After all, how is a Dalai Lama simply reincarnated/reborn/manifested out there in the countryside somewhere, only later to be confirmed by testing and rigorous examination of details about which only the One would know? Such things defy reason… but that’s the point. Now maybe they just got lucky, and happened to choose someone who turned out to become a religious master, or maybe he’s just a very adept student… but that’s a win/win situation, not a victory of nurture over nature. Or maybe he really IS the reincarnation of something/someone who is more spiritual than material. It’s no accident that Jesus came along right as we were losing our instinctual spirituality and trading it for a philosophical one. And it’s no accident that the Dalai Lama is on the world stage at the same time that China completes its dialectically materialistic rebirth/return to prominence after a long self-imposed detour into self-doubt.

‘Dalai Lama Renaissance’ is the award-winning documentary- produced and directed by Kasyar Darvich and narrated by Harrison Ford- that resulted from the Dalai Lama’s meeting a decade ago with the so-called ‘Synthesis Group’ of forty Western ‘renaissance’ thinkers, and some of the thought that resulted. But even more than their thought, it documents the simple direct yet thorough religious thought of the Dalai Lama himself, vast yet disciplined… like the sea (‘Dalai’) itself. The Western thinkers, after all, came with their own viewpoints and prejudices, and though certainly well-intentioned, also full of opinions not always without controversy, and not always accepted by their peers in their respected sciences. These are, for example, some of the same physicists featured in What the Bleep Do We Know?, a documentary similar in message, that caused much controversy by its misrepresentation of scientific opinion, especially the continuing efforts by some to postulate a ‘quantum religion’ that dates back at least to The Tao of Physics. Despite harsh denials by physics’ best minds, this is an effort that somehow tries to elevate physics’ Uncertainty Principle into a metaphysical category. The distinction is simple, if often missed. Religion is about certainties, and the belief systems that are both cause and effect of that. Science is about theory, and the testing that produces it and results from it. The two activities are not the same thing. To ‘believe’ in science is a contradiction in terms.

Fortunately the Dalai Lama is disciplined enough to stay within his field and domain, which is the place of the individual- and his happiness… or not- in the world. His social message is fairly simple, similar to the Four Noble Truths themselves, and can be summarized as such: 1) change is constant, 2) man’s nature is essentially good, 3) bad things happen, 4) society can become corrupt, 5) change it.

Best of all, you can dance to it, or just listen in contented bliss. What Kasyar Darvich has accomplished cinematically, Michael Tyabji has seconded musically, pulling together a group as diverse as it is accomplished. This includes guitarist Larry Mitchell, composer Medicine Bear, The Yoginis, Heyraneh, and… the list goes on. Though incorporating many different instruments and sounds of Nature, too, the soundtrack leans heavily on classical sitar and the voice of the Dalai Lama himself, offering choice helpings of Buddhist wisdom mixed with good ol’ common sense. When the music starts to drift off into trance, the Dalai Lama’s voice brings it right back down to Earth. And if that’s not enough, you can hear Harrison Ford apparently teaching William Shatner how to rap in ‘Drops of Gold’: “words, words, words are mere bubbles of water… but deeds are drops of gold… you, yourself, must make the effort… the Buddhas are only teachers.” Cost of the soundtrack album: not so much; value of hearing Harrison Ford do Buddhist spoken word with the Dalai Lama: priceless. The release is timed to coincide with the Dalai Lama’s speaking tour of the US May 12-23. Is there Tibetan politics behind all this? Probably so, and that’s where it’ll stay. Hardie K says check it out.

LEVAME AOS FADOS by Ana Moura- Portuguese Soul Music

Fado has been one of the big musical disappointments of my life- until now that is. It’s not like they played it on the AM radio back when and where I was growing up, so the knowledge of it came slowly and packaged with a certain amount of mystery and mysticism attached. It seemed to be way cool, and I looked forward to the day when I could sit and listen to it, preferably in the flesh, the real thing, in a real fado house in Portugal. It’s not like I could just open up MySpace and do a search on Amalia Rodrigues and take it from there, or even go down to Amoeba Records or Bleecker Street and rummage through the racks. We didn’t have anything like that. So naturally one of the first things I wanted to do when I finally got the opportunity to visit Portugal was to sit down and listen to some down-home fado- simple, right? Well, considering that my train came in to Lisbon on a Sunday overnight from Madrid, and when I got off in the old port and one of the first things I saw was a sign written on a notice-board at the community center reading, “FADO HOJE!”, I’d say the odds were looking pretty good. So I booked a hotel close by, took a shower, and resolved to go listen to fado my first afternoon in Lisbon. I’ll need some help, of course, and that means some strong coffee.

So I got there at the time indicated and I was the first one there- not good. But eventually people came trickling in one by one, until the place filled up. Then I spilled my espresso all over my notebook- not good. Finally the music started. There was only one problem- it wasn’t very good. Now maybe that’s because of the lack of a big star or the fact that it was afternoon- not evening- fado, but the result was the same- disappointment. One by one self-styled crooners got up on stage and… proceeded to butcher the music, much more concerned with the high drama of the moment than the careful execution of the songs’ intricacies. It was more like bad karaoke than good fado. I left early, in something of a huff if I remember correctly.

Then Mariza came along a few years ago and made a big splash in world music circles, but I’m still not getting it. The high drama just seems all out of proportion to any kind of emotion that seems real to me. If fado is something typically a bit sad and mournful, then why belt it to the skies with flash and flourish? I’d more likely be crying alone in my beer. That doesn’t sell records, of course, but you get my point. When a speed guitarist plays the blues, no matter how much influence he derived from it, it’s no longer blues.

Now there’s Ana Moura and her new album Leva-me Aos Fados (‘Take Me to the Fados’)- aaaahhhhh. Now this is what I wanted all along, sad and mournful, deep and searching, but without all the dramatic affectation, just simple…. Como se diz?... soul. This is not only the real thing, but it goes down smoothe… like fine wine. She and her primary collaborator and songwriter Jorge Fernando have created a real gem here. The title track is one of Fernando’s and sets the tone for the album well- sad and mournful, yet at the same time yearning and hopeful. Fernando’s other songs- A Penumbra (At Twilight), Rumo Ao Sul (Heading South), and Que Dizer de Nos (What to Say of Us) continue in that same vein. Rumo Ao Sul is in fact of the album’s nicest songs, a change-of-rhythmic-pace that works nicely, pure balladry in the final good-bye of a lover’s parting.

The album has many other great moments also, and they’re not all sad and slow, either, though they do tend to be limited to acoustic guitar, by definition I suppose. Como Uma Nuvem No Ceu (‘Like a Cloud in the Sky’) is light and bouncy, as is Fado Vestido De Fado (‘Fado Dressed in Fado’) a nice little play on the meaning of fado as ‘fate” and a nice little tune to boot, with some really good playful guitar. Then there’s Critica Da Razao Pura (‘Critique of Pure Reason’), a nice little tongue-in-cheek number that asks the big questions. No, you won’t have to re-study Immanuel Kant to enjoy this. Emotion is the ultimate critique of pure reason, and it triumphs handily here, and in the album as a whole. The final song says it all, Nao E Um Fado Normal (‘It’s not Normal Fado’). No, it’s not. It’s pretty… spectacular? No, that’s not the word. It’s deep, yet simple… penetrating and soothing, like medicine for the soul. It’s Leva-me Aos Fados by Ana Moura. Hardie K says check it out.