Unlike compilations that just sample three or four ?ber-famous Brazilian artists, BB4 encompasses a wider range of Brazilian music. Paz E “Arroz,” for example, takes samba’s hip-shaking feel and puts it into pop; Brazilian musical stalwart Jorge Ben originally recorded the song in the ’70s. The Sonia Rosa/Yuji Ohno version of “Casa Forte,” often recorded and usually horn-driven, strips the songs down and ups the jazz percussion. Star DJ Marky shows up, too, working with XRS to remix an excellent Ive Mendes song. And there are still traditional touches, like the two songs about the dance/martial art capoeira.
Dakah Hip-Hop Orchestra Unfinished Symphony
Dakah lays down the gauntlet for those “producers” who recycle samples, nudge already-hackneyed beats and call the result “hip-hop.” The LA-based 60-plus piece orchestra shows the difference live musicians can make on tracks like “Adiago Asiago” (subtitled “Tryin II Sow My Love”), a love song where swelling woodwinds are grounded with unhurried percussion. Another standout is “Invocation of the Duke,” where the scratching lets the Latin percussion and string- and horn-laden instrumentation take the foreground. Minor quibble: sometimes the instruments overwhelm the sung and rapped vocals. But overall, Unfinished Symphony is outstanding and hopefully indicative of more to come.
Animal Collective Here Comes the Indian
To balance the weight of technological artificiality on a single blade of grass is to achieve some great, transcendent understanding of modernity. And to gain this understanding is to unlock the mysticism of Animal Collective’s latest album. Although seemingly noisy and covered with grime and grease, the tracks that appear on Here Comes the Indian originate in droning tones, tribal chants and the forest rock of the UK circa 1970. Buzzing, bubbling, sucking and squeaking, these jams do for the ears what a few mushroom caps will do for the eyes.
Tom Clark King Tide
German DJ/producer Tom Clark has started three record labels (the now-defunct Gold Plate Music, Highgrade Records, and Laufwerk Musik) while producing for other imprints like Poker Flat, Rampe D and SuperBra, and maintaining a residency at Berlin’s famed Tresor club. Clark’s debut album offers solid minimal tech-house that flows from organic textures, although tracks like “Flying Carpet” move smoothly and somewhat uninterestingly without really going anywhere. Other cuts, like “Slip Out,” show Clark’s talent for minimal composition by carving an entire track from a single piano note and deep rhythms. Like MRI with less sophisticated song structure.
Various Retro>Future
Aussie DJs Phil K and Ben & Lex offer two funky breaks mixes that sound more like mid-’90s West Coast than post-millennium Down Under. Phil K’s set indulges in plenty of trancey overtones throughout, with most tracks sounding like they were plucked from some early AM rave set from around that time. Ben & Lex offer a more minimal and interesting ensemble that shifts into more relaxed grooves about halfway through. San Francisco’s An-ten-nae delivers the strongest cuts on each of these two mixes, adding some much-needed electro beatwork to these otherwise dated offerings.
Mitchell & Dewbury Rappin With the Gods
It’s hard to be anything but a cynic these days, but somehow Mitchell & Dewbury have managed to rise above the times on this album of uplifting deep jazz. Rolling organs, testifying choruses and fat, sassy basslines are all present and accounted for on epic jams like “Globetrotter,” while elsewhere the pair pays much respect to Afro and Latin roots, and nods to disco on the title track. If you can open those jaded ears (and overlook some occasionally heavy-handed lyrics), Rappin With the Gods is full of the unified sounds of hope.
Bonobo Dial ‘M’ For Monkey
Keep it simple, stupid. Bonobo, a.k.a. Simon Green, is one of the few electronic producers to heed that annoying yet sage advice, and the result is a warm, beautifully crafted follow-up to his 2001 debut, Animal Magic. The sonic territory covered here is much the same, with delicate guitars and the occasional sitar nestled next to plucky basslines and crisp drum work. Yet Green’s sophomore effort shows a maturing sense of song structure. The tracks are still loop-based, but cuts like “Change Down” and “Wayward Bob” shine with careful addition and subtraction, their basic elements factoring together to become a more significant whole. At a concise 40 minutes, Dial ‘M’ For Monkey doesn’t overstay its welcome, feeling like the aural equivalent of a good friend’s briefly shared secret dream.
Various Decks and the City Vol. 2: Chicago/DIZ
From deep and dubby to jacked and jerky, Chicago’s native son Diz stays true to his roots on this tight mix. After a somewhat forgettable start, with cuts from Sysco and David Duriez that otherwise might be standouts on a lesser compilation, Diz hits his stride on his own collaboration with Iz, “Love It, Dub it.” When Mark Farina announces that it’s “Time to Jack,” you know the goods are on their way, and the ensuing funk builds to a fitting finale with Joshua’s bleeping, tracky masterpiece “Hustlin.” If the crew is as strong as Diz’s, no harm representin’.
VARIOUS ARTISTS Amoeba Music Vol. Iv
Amoeba’s latest melange includes everything from womanist spoken word to indie shogazer pap-all culled from the East Bay, Frisco and LA scenes. The totally hype parts: Balanceman’s quirky Soup Or Spy?”, which combines ’70s spy-film horns with outer-spacey studio effects, Mr. Lif’s agitpropist “Earthcrusher,” and Lo Lo Swift’s sick flows on Equipto’s “Rap Attack.” The more restrained, but still dope, parts: Loquat’s dulcet and schmaltzy “To the Floor,” Lil Miss Ju Ju B’s schizoid “S&M Boulevard” and Tim’m’s loping, Spearhead-y “Red Dirt.” Good pickin’s, overall: some of Volume IV’s 39 tracks are wacker than others, but none warrants a diss. “
The Gossip Movement
Detractors of bitter chick rock will find the Gossip’s variant to be a coup de grace. Their new album, Movementbetween Sleater Kinney and the Ramones. But the Gossip gives its forerunners a run for their money: they’ve balanced catchy handclaps (“Fire/Sign”) with gospelly dirges (“All My Days”), and Beth’s voice might have been plucked from some coalminer’s daughter in a Southern shantytown. The Gossip has a sound that’s unlike most garage rock: their songs are as bruising and bluesy as any backporch folk, but appropriately feedback-laced and ardently pissed-off.
