Tags: Pop Music, Tinariwen, Alice Smith, Veronicas, Yardbirds, FreshlyGround, M.I.A.Most people like music, and most people have collections of CDs and / or albums and I'll betcha out of whatever number you have there are maybe 4 or 5 that you go back and keep listening to... here are a few I've enjoyed immensely over the past two years:
ALICE SMITH - Do you like stuff the Beatles recorded circa White Album? You'll like Alice's CD. Do you enjoy the more sultry Nora Jones tunes? You'll like Alice's CD. If you're down with a little bit of African world seasoning, you'll like Alice's CD. AliceSmithMusic is something your musical taste has to experience a few times before you decide on the songs you like the best.
THE VERONICAS - Although their most recent CD is real stinker (The Postal Service meets Junk Disco) The Veronica's first CD (pictured) is one of the best guitar-rock oriented girl group CD's I've ever heard: out of the 12 or 13 songs I love around 9 or 10, and that's pretty good! Big question is: who the heck sent these girls out on a wild technopop goose chase? the new CD sounds like a refugee from the post-"Pump Up The Jam" era. Avoid it at all costs!
FRESHLY GROUND - It's so hard to DESCRIBE a song or a sound that song makes, but here goes: for me, South Africa's FreshlyGround invoke a myriad of musical memories, from 1970s soul to Sade to Donovan to The Incredible String Band to Malcolm McLaren to Brenda Russel to Jefferson Airplane to Jaci Velasquez.
A happy-sad whipped up folk-soul sound that wraps itself around you and reminds you of all those great performers but sounds like none.
Flutes, violins, guitars, beats... all there in one splendid recording! FreshlyGround may never grow an audience in the USA, but just as Michael Learns To Rock cranked out hits that rocked the
rest of the planet during the 1990's, FG obviously has the capabilities to do the same thing now... and they're doing it! The group recently released a third CD. All three are excellent!
M.I.A. - There is no one and nothing like M.I.A.!
Her debut album, “Arular” (2005), sold a modest 129,000 copies but was a critical jackpot, both in the mainstream press and the blogosphere. For her follow-up, “Kala,” released by Interscope Records earlier this year, the original strategy was the conventional one: to pair up with brand-name producers and shoot for pop hits. But things did not go according to plan. Instead the album became, by necessity and by choice, another restless, far-flung journey. [
NYT] The album was recorded around the world (
Japan,
India, Trinidad,
Jamaica,
Australia, the United States), and apparently just about everything was in play during those sessions: African chants,
Caribbean soca, Brazilian baile funk, Western rock, Bollywood tunes,
Baltimore club beats. The resulting mix sounds like the index from "The Rough Guide to World Music" pressed through a hip-hop filter, and it provides a perfectly expansive frame for M.I.A.'s worldly lyrical concerns, which tend to revolve around poverty, boys and war (not necessarily in that order). [
WaPo]
I have no idea why I love the cacophony served up by 31-year-old
Maya Arulpragasam. M.I.A.'s work slowly grows on you, working its way into your brain like a little parasite. The only thing I can compare the M.I.A. lsitening experience to is
Tinariwen, although their music is nothing alike. But take a glass of red wine, get together with a few friends on a warm summer night gathered around a campfire on a beach at Long Island, with Tinariwen playing in the background. Music that eventually overtakes your spirit. M.I.A. overtakes your spirit but hits you between the eyes first; that surely is the difference!
TINARIWEN - I recently listened to my three
Tinariwen CD's end to end in tandem. When played all the way through in it's entirety, I found The Radio Tisdas Sessions delightful. Friends have asked why I like Tinariwen (
Tamashek for "empty places"). I can only answer that, on a quite night while relaxing (blogging) or just lying on the couch, I get into the guitarwork. That's the attraction, the guitars. In the past I have read reviewer's comments that critcized the production / engineering of the first two CDs. Both reviewers felt the songs were faded out too quickly, with little improv. Now that I've listened more deeply, I agree. CD's 1 and 2 would be far superior had the band been allowed to continue the session. Gee whiz, the CD itself certainly has enough room to contain the extra recording time! What's my favourite song? "Matadjem Yinmixan" on "Aman Iman." Love the guitars! Incredibly soothing! Fitted in perfectly with the 4th CD in my changer: the Sunspots label CD re-issue / update of "Havin' A Rave-Up" by the Yardbirds!!!
YARDBIRDS - I took a copy of "Havin A Rave-Up: The Definitive Edition" (Sunspots CD) and added
a few other great Y-Birds trax to make a ridiculously wonderful guitar-heavy collection of some of the best music that came out of the 1960s era! If you like guitars, you'll love The Veronicas, Tinariwen AND the Yardbirds. I hope you'll get a few gift ideas from this music sampling: remember there are HUNDREDS of acts out there will all kinds of marvelous sounds just waiting for your ears to hear them!
“No Dancing da ‘Mãe Ju’ começa-se a dançar às 14h
, recently published by 
