Hello and welcome to the weekly preview of Around the World.
Around the World is on Ferry FM and Slice Audio on Sundays at 10:00 pm to midnight and on Tuesdays at 7:00 pm on Bangor FM, Lisburn’s 98FM and FM105 Down Community Radio.
Listen to last week’s first hour here and the second hour here. Both are on Mixcloud.
Featured Album: The musical “root” of Around the World was to find a crossroads where traditional and folk music meet modern arrangements, production, and rock. Not “folk rock” as such, but in that broadest of category. It didn’t take long for me to realise what a narrow view I had adopted. This week’s Featured Album has many of the elements of traditional music – largely black music – mixed with heavy dance rhythms. And a fine introduction to afrobeat it is, too. It is also a trip around the world itself. RepublicAfrobeat Vol 5 is itself a quick global dash. I’ll be playing music from London, Warsaw, Nigeria and Kenya.
Abroad thoughts from Home: (Clifford T. Ward, anyone?) As the potential for travelling abroad this year evaporates before our hungry eyes, the music I’ll play on the show, I hope, will help transport the spirits instead. But there’s much to be enjoyed from home. New singles from Hex Hue and Brand New Friend and preview of the new Saint Sister album and another track from the impressive Trú album.
Even though it is a busy time for music from around the planet, there is a stack of great music from home – and I’ll always squeeze in what I can.
New and Oddities: I’ll be first to say that I play some odd stuff.And there are some great examples this week. Starting with the entertainly eccentric and creative Radio Tutti & Barilla Sisters (have a listen on their website). Here’s (a translation of) what they say. “Electron liberated in the galaxy of the current world sound system, Radio Tutti & Barilla Sisters once again awakens the force with an explosive 2nd album. The music of southern Europe takes on a new shoot of classy arrangements and electro-shock for this trance-genre ball.
“With XOGO, it is Galicia that serves as a matrix for an imaginary and festive folklore that draws on the energies of Earth from the depths of time. The female voices remain the threads of this patchwork navigating between popular Mediterranean or oriental music and Creolized growths from across the Atlantic, with many additions. A real village-world festival!”
All I say is “Strange and strangely enjoyable.”
This is not the track I’ll be playing
I will be playing this: Leenalchi (이날치) - Please Don't Go (여보나리) and thanks to Mike Philpot for letting me know that this had been released. Last year’s album for Leenalchi Sugungga was one of my favourites. I’ll keep the lecture on who Leenalchi are, why they have that name and other interesting facts until they release their next album. In the meantime, watch the video and see what you think of the bass guitar/lead guitar balance. Or just enjoy the performance.
Another big favourite from last year was Singer of Tales from Damir Imamović. I was listening to one of his older albums this week and decided to play Damir Imamovic Oj, Vesela Veselice from Svrzina Kuća. And while composing this newsletter, I found a more recent “as live” version recorded in his from room from last year.
And here is one to look out (or listen out) for gabriele muscolino’s single Il ragazzo che saliva sugli alberi. I listened to the first few seconds and thought “No … not my sort of thing.” But listened on as I went looking for something else. Then I thought “Hmmm, not too bad.” Six minutes later I was off in search of his album, which I’ll be listening to next week and I expect playing more from. Mind you, this might be the cheapest video ever made:
Finally – going back to the original theme. I have found a lot of excellent music which as taken traditional theme and songs and mixed them into electronic dance music. The most recent being ILMU who take music from Karelia a Russian republic on the border with Finland. Stunning music.
I’m now a member of the World Music Chart jury. WMCE is published monthly. There are some 40 radio producers and presenters on the nominating panel, and I am very happy to say that I have been invited to contribute. https://www.wmce.de/
Links:
What music should I be listening to? Send me a message about your music suggestions via my blog.
The Around the World archive on Mixcloud: https://www.mixcloud.com/davysims/
Slice Audio: https://www.slice.audio/
Ferry FM: https://ferryfm.com/
And on Radio Garden
Bangor FM 107.9:http://radio.garden/listen/bangor-fm-107-9/IycUhUbT
Lisburn’s 98FM:http://radio.garden/listen/facebook/ASeqAEl8
FM105 Down Community Radio:http://radio.garden/listen/fm-105-down-community-radio/K8lBDGFf
Last week’s playlist is here.