12 October 2016, World Cafe

1 Shabaka and the Ancestors – The Observer (Brownswood Recordings)

Album: Wisdom of Elders

Shabaka Hutchings released an instantly classic record a couple weeks ago, for the first time under his own name, with a killer SA band: basically, trumpeter Mandla Mlangeni’s Amandla Freedom Ensemble with quite a few reinforcements, like Nduduzo Makhitini on piano and the most spectral of Fender Rhodes.  My record of the year so far, in case you had any doubt.  “The Observer” is named after a veteran calypsonian whose song made an indelible impression on Shabaka when he was 15 in the Calypso Tent in Barbados.  Shabaka aimed at getting the melancholic feeling of the song he could never forget, not the melody. 

Download at Bandcamp: https://shabakaandtheancestors.bandcamp.com/album/wisdom-of-elders

2 M.A.K.U. Sound System – De Barrio (Glitterbeat Records)

Album: Mezcla

Staying vaguely in the Caribbean -  Colombia does have a Caribbean coast.  The MAKU Sound System is actually a NYC based band of mostly Colombian immigrants.  They started about 6 years ago, and we played a bunch of stuff off their first album.  The new one is also a great thing, called Mezcla, which roughly translates as a "mix of shared influences and differences".  “De Barrio” is a waltz about what it’s like to be an immigrant.

3 Anthony Joseph – Neckbone (Strut)

Album: Caribbean Roots

Anthony Joseph is a British/Trinidadian poet with a delivery very like Gil Scott-Heron, and on this song, Neckbone, he’s teamed with another Trinidadian, the calypso star David Rudder.  Shabaka Hutchings is there in the brass section, and those fantastic steel drums ("fantastic" and "steel drums" are not words and phases or whatever put together lightly) are by Andy Narell of all people.

4 Mala – Markos Swagga (Brownswood Recordings)

Album: Mirrors

The Shabaka Hutchings’s record, under the name Shabaka and the Ancestors, came out on the British label, Brownswood Records, and so here are a couple of fairly recent Brownswood Records recordings.  Mala, who the musical press like to call a "dubstep artist", for his second record had a deep dive into Peruvian tropical bass. 

5 Dayme Arocena – Madres (Brownswood)

Album: Nueva Era

Santeria is an Afro-Cuban religion that Dayme Arocena is steeped in.  She pays homage to the Yoruba gods Yemaya and Ochun on “Madres”.

6 Lee Perry – Music & Science Madness (On-U Sound)

Album: Sherwood at the Controls, Volume 2: 1985 – 1990

In 1987, Lee Perry put out a classic record that I ended up playing to death at the time. 

7 The Aggrovators – Dub Fi Gwaan (VP Records)

Album: The Aggrovators Dubbing at King Tubby’s

At least three of the most classic dub producers of all time there in those two tracks – Lee Perry, Adrian Sherwood, and King Tubby.  It was King Tubby studio at which the Aggrovators recorded Dub Fi Gwaan sometime in the 70s.  Not sure who the mixer was there – could have been King Tubby, Prince Jammy or Scientist.  Bunny Lee produced.

8 Getachew Mekuria & The Ex & Friends – Bati (Terp Records)

Album: Y’Anbessaw Tezeta

I’ve made the links between Shabaka’s playing and that of Getachew Mekuria, the incredible Ethiopian sax player who drew heavily on traditional warrior music called shellela.  Mekuria died in April of this year and the last album he made was with the Dutch band, The Ex, who started out as some kind of anarchco-punk band and ended up being something else altogether, with their spirit fully intact.  “Y’Anbessaw Tezeta” is Amharic for “The Memory of the Lion”. 

9 Skyjack – Tafattala (Werkstatt Records) (Shane Cooper)

Album: Skyjack

The SA-Swiss group, Skyjack, with an Ethio-jazz tune by Shane Cooper.  “Tafattala” means something like "weave or woven together".  Skyjack recently played at the Reeder Hall in Rondebosch and took the roof off the place: besides Shane Cooper who is serious Ethio-jazz fan – he said that he listened to nothing else in his car for months - they are: Kesivan Naidoo, Kyle Shepherd, Andreas Tchopp and Marc Stucki.  There’s Shabaka Hutchings connection too – but you can figure that out …

10 Kristi Stassinopoulou & Stathis Kalyviotis – Ouden Oida (I know nothing) (Riverboat)        

Album: NYN

Kristi Stassinopoulou and Stathis Kalyviotis have woven all kinds of things into traditional Greek lauto or lute music on their new record called Nyn – Now, in Greek of the ancient variety.  It’s a kind of personal take on Greece’s grinding economic crisis.  “Ouden Oida” is huge is scope encompassing all sides of the Mediterranean, with a devasting chorus: “The only thing I know is that I know nothing”

11 Lajko Felix – Szivaroztam (Hangveto)

Album: Most Jottem  

The seriously wonderful Hungerian fiddle player, Lajko Felix, with a song he calls “Smoked Cigars” from 2016 album, Most Jottem “I just arrived”.  Can’t figure out who the stunning singer is here – not enough info.  She’s one of three awesome singers on the record. 

12 Banda Nella Nebbia – Green Grove/Sitam Zaliam Gojuj (Unzipped Fly Records)

Album: Banda Nella Nebbia

Banda Nella Nebbia are a 10 piece orchestra from Poland headed by a bassist-composer from Lithuania, Franciszek Szpilman. Heavily influenced by klezmer.

13 Tumi Mogorosi – Gift of Three (Jazzman Records)

Album: Project Elo

“Gift of Three” is the last tune on drummer Tumi Mogorosi’s album for a sextet and 4 voices called Project Elo, that channels the spirit of John Coltrane hugely.  Mogorosi ended up releasing this record through a British label, Jazzman Records, because he was offered such a raw deal in SA.  You can and should download it from Bandcamp.

https://tumimogorosi.bandcamp.com/releases

Mogorosi is the drummer on Shabaka’s album – and you need to check out the duet with the two of them on that record. 

14 Ayuune Sule – Who Knows Tomorrow (Makkum Records)

Album: This is Kologo Power!

A few months ago I spoke about the wave of kologo music hitting northern Ghana – the kologo being a two-stringed lute.

Some purple prose I really dig on the topic “the kologo becomes a vessel for melancholy and emotional sincerity, channelling human spirit in the scuff of nails and buzz of fingers pressed against the instrument neck … wiring itself into human reflex, accentuating every emotional sentiment with its urgent sound”. 

From a collection put together by King Ayisoba, the star of the scene, and Arnold De Boer, of The Ex (we spoke about them earlier). 

15 Mabiisi – Buuda Yembre (Akwaaba Music)

Album: Mabiisi

Mabiisi is a duo from northern Ghana and Burkina Faso, two linguistically and culturally very interlinked areas.  In both languages “Mabiisi” means the same thing: “Brothers of the same mother”.  Art Melody is a rapper from Burkino and Stevo Atambire a kologo player from Ghana. 

http://www.akwaabamusic.com/de/releases-old/mabiisi/

16 Sarathy Korwar – Eyes Closed (Ninja Tune)

Album: Day to day

The Gujarat-based Siddi are descended from seventh century migrants from East Africa – merchants, sailors and slaves.  US-born, India-raised, London-based composer, percussionist and producer Sarathy Korwar, has used the music of the Siddi as a launching pad for his debut recorded foray.  He builds his stuff around field recordings he made in Gujurat.  The Siddi have a bunch of mouth bow type instruments – very much like the uhadi and umrhubhe – one is called the malunga.  Here Salim Gulammohommad combines forces with Cape Town’s Cara Stacey, both on mouth bows.   

17 Tanya Tagaq with Michael Red – The Godson / Open Boreal (Caribou Records)

Album: Listen Up: Music from Canada’s North 

Tanya Tagaq is an Inuk throat singer from Cambridge Bay in Canada, I guess you could say if you’re looking for labels, and here’s her collaboration with Vancouver-based producer Michael Red from 2007.    

18 Sinikka Langeland – Jacob’s Dream (ECM)

Album: The Magical Forest

Finnskogen or the Magical Forest, the forested area in eastern Norway bordering Sweden has been Sinikka Langeland’s home since 1992, and she built new album on myths and legends from the area.  In mix are fellow Norwegians, trumpeter Arve Hendriksen, sax player Trygve Seim, Swedish bassist Anders Jormin and Finnish drummer Markku Ounaskari, plus the vocal group Trio Mediaeval.  Langeland sings and plays the Kantele, a Finnish table zither.

19 Marc Stucki – Perpetuum Mobile (Werkstatt Records/Unit Records)

Album: 172 Jours a Paris

In 2014 Marc Stucki, the Swiss saxophonist with Skyjack who we heard earlier, spent time in Paris recording in subways and under bridges near the Seine, so that the environment becomes the second instrument. 

20 Stein Urheim – Oh so nice (Hubro)

Album: Strandebarm

Stein Urheim mainly plays all kinds of string instruments, but he also plays harmonica, pocket cornet and tape recorders of various kinds.  His new record, Strandebarm, is named after a former ship building town in Norway, and he recorded it in Strandebarm Church.

21 Ryley Walker – A Choir Apart  (Dead Oceans)

Album: Golden sings that have been sung

Chicago based guitarist, Ryley Walker, channelling the best of 70s British folk rock.  There’s a line in there that everyone seems to like and identify with – “Wise ass wisdom, wasted on the young …”

22 Sarathy Korwar – Mawra (NinjaTunes)

Album: Day to day

Korwar’s Siddi inspired and infused music, this time with Shabaka Hutchings to the fore playing the bass clarinet.

23 Piccola Orchestra Gagarin – Krutitsa (Whatabout Music)

Album: Vostok

Piccola Orchestra Gagarin seem to be a Spanish Russian trio - and that’s about all I know about them, other than that they sound like a trio that Bill Fissell would head.