As the summer heat fades, Salomé de Bahia comes through to keep the tropical fires burning. With production by Yellow boss Bob Sinclar, the singer best known for “Outro Lugar” sways and swaggers through standards like “Mas Que Nada” and a housed-up “Copacabana” with her signature vibrant, full-throated Portuguese propelling percussion- and horn-heavy arrangements. Despite a few schmaltzy missteps (like the overripe “Lança Perfume”), Brasil is an album of Latin and house tracks as big and bold as its namesake.
Isolée We Are Monster
From the menacing, minor-key mutations of the first track, “Pictureloved,” to the sprawling, sexy 10-minute chug of “Pillowtalk,” the second artist album from Isolée (a.k.a. Rajko Müller) is a masterpiece. While “Pillowtalk”-with its swelling and shifting plucked melodies-probably comes closest to evoking the sublime tech house groove of Isolée‘s reputation-making single, “Beau Mot Plage,” We Are Monster further explores Müller‘s affection for rock, with “Schrapnell” driven by an echoing lick and a salty pair of slide guitars and strings and more fretwork pushing the grind of “Today.” The album is not entirely flawless-the plodding lurch of “Jelly Baby/Fish” grows a tad annoying with repeated listens-but with the slurping electro and absolutely massive breakdown of “My Hi-Matic” and the way songs like “Face B” evolve with a complexity matched by their delicious visceral details, Isolée has made a wondrous beast with a life all its own.
Various Artists Version Excursion
Counterpoint has over 10 years of experience putting together killer compilations like Disco Juice and Jazz Bizniz. Rest assured their producer buddies (Yam Who?, Beatfanatic) had plenty to work with when turned loose in the vaults for this collection of re-versions. There‘s a little bit of everything, from the choppy, gloriously spastic vocals of Les Gammas‘ take on Sheila Landis‘ broken beat “Parenthe-Seizure” to a typically slick and swaying Nicola Conte bossa remix of Sunaga T Experience‘s “It‘s You.” But everything meshes together nicely with a shared jazz/dance sensibility that emphasizes chops as much as beats.
T.O.K. Unknown Language
A guilty pleasure that fits the summer of 2005 like a glove, T.O.K.‘s second album, Unknown Language, offers a slice of Jamaican dancehall in its most unabashedly American-influenced form. A power pop record in patois, Unknown collects all of the suave foursome‘s singles (“Gal You Ah Lead,” “Galang Gal”) from the past three years along with a smattering of new songs like the semi-conscious “Wah Gwaan” and the pulsing “Neck Breakers.” While a remix of the reggaeton-flavored “She‘s Hotter” featuring Miami thug Pitbull may be the foursome‘s most fire single to date, the highlight may be “Tell Me If You Still Care,” a sentimental ballad over Arif Cooper‘s Celebration riddim that evokes the group‘s roots in late ‘80s/early ‘90s American R
QNC Duo Dynamic
While they repped Strong Island to the fullest, the late ‘80s crew JVC Force was among the first hip-hop acts to find their core fanbase overseas. These days that‘s the norm for underground rap. It‘s particularly true for QNC, a duo featuring former JVC DJ/producer Curt Cazal (now also an MC) and Q Ball, a fellow Central Islip, NY MC whose voice sounds a whole lot like Jay-Z. On Duo Dynamic, the pair brings the heat ‘95-style-hard rhymes over hard beats-only now there‘s references to Irish girls asses and wilin‘ in Scotland, and their Manchester-based label is run by Mark Rae of Rae & Christian. Guru, M.O.P. and Camp Lo all make appearances but the heat is in the beats, produced by Cazal in the new home studio he‘s dubbed “D&D Studios East.”
Gang Gang Dance God‘s Money
If Fat Albert‘s Junkyard Band were eccentric Brooklyn indies acting on the impulses of an extensive world music collection, they might make a record like God‘s Money in 2005. Recorded at Junkyard Audio Salvage-a self-explanatory playground for analogophiles in Greenpoint-GGD allegedly made use of every noise-making device they could find during the year-long recording of their second LP. The result is a worldly soundclash of the “only in New York” variety; a beautiful/ugly mishmash of tribal drums, Middle Eastern rhythms, Baltic new wave, unconfined psychedelic experimentalism, and vocalist Lizzie Bougatsos‘ sometimes beautiful, sometimes horrifically off-putting chirps. While it often seems like a magic ride to nowhere, the net result nonetheless feels earth-shatteringly profound.
Klement Bonelli Ethna
Like Dennis Ferrer and Jerome Sydenham‘s dancefloor redefining “Sandcastles,” “Ethna” is sonic revolution incarnate. With stellar remix assistance by Wave Music artist D‘Malicious, French producer Klement Bonelli has created a sound full of sophisticated rawness, and these techy and soulful bits will appeal to tech and house heads yearning for a better musical future. One of ‘05‘s essential tunes.
Brian Aneurysm Das Element Des Menschen
A warehouse workhorse, “Unwanted” is the gem on this debut release by Brian Aneurysm (an alias of producer Bernhard Pucher). Similar to, but not quite as clever as early Cybotron or Mr. Fingers‘ releases, the James T. Cotton version of “Das Element Des Menschen” regressively acquaints new listeners with the groove that Jack built. Fans of Tangent Beats and Tuning Spork will enjoy this release for its diverse musical approach.
Booka Shade Mandarine EP
Shifting away from their more esoteric and dizzying sounds, the production duo of Walter Merziger and Arno Kammemeier has created one for the dancer in all of us. “Point Break” is a rude groove that bubbles with deeply syncopated repetition, while “Mandarine Girl” is a mélange of tweaked melodic realizations and progressive synth lines. Fans of Pokerflat and Palette will definitely dig this one.
Kevin Blechdom Eat My Heart Out
No, you did not see the psychosexual album cover; move on. Blechdom needs to move on likewise from her Fisher Price-made synth presets and ditties that were once amusing five years ago. Eat My Heart Out is basically a set of ballads from a lovesick and fetal-positioned soul. As irony barely excuses bad art these days, the Hallmark-quality poetry and the tacky Nickelodeon pop do not muster-although the Mr. Rogers chimes that begin “Torture Chamber” are amusing. “It‘s funny, being yourself is making a joke itself,” Kevin utters to herself at one point. Indeed.
