Note :

http://www.myspace.com/soulsavers

Origine du Groupe : North America

Style : Alternative , Electro Rock

Sortie : 2009

Tracklist :
01 - The Seventh Proof
02 - Death Bells
03 - Unbalanced Pieces
04 - You Will Miss Me When I Burn
05 - Some Misunderstanding
06 - All The Way Down
07 - Shadow Falls
08 - Can't Catch The Train
09 - Pharaohs Chariot
10 - Praying Ground
11 - Rolling Sky
12 - Wise Blood
13 - By My Side 

Une nouvelle fois réunis, Mark Lanegan et les  Soulsavers s'y sont engagés : avec Broken, les âmes sensibles ne seront pas épargnées. Le chanteur à la posture ténébreuse y imprègne de sa voix sublimement éraillée pas moins de neuf titres sur quatorze. Par laquelle, plus encore que pour It's not how far you fall, it's the way you land, il nous invite à partager un voyage electro, trip hop, americana auprès de ses amis.
Ce périple sur des terres sombres et poussiéreuses nous plonge de suite dans des atmosphères cinématographiques. Entre L'assassinat de Jesse James par le lâche Robert Ford (musique de Nick Cave et Warren Ellis) et There Will be Blood (musique de Jonny Greenwood), "Seventh Proof" et "Wise Blood", les deux instrumentaux de l'album évoquent immanquablement les ambiances de ces deux westerns naturalistes. Une partie du décor est planté. Et qui d'autre de mieux que Mark Lanegan pour le magnifier ? Son nom est... personne. La preuve, même s'il est épaulé par d'autres chanteurs reconnus, ils ne sont réellement là que pour souligner sa voix. Sur "Death Bells", une chevauchée du diable, Gibby Haines des Butthole Surfers ne fait qu'une apparition sonore, tout comme le grand Mike Patton avec "Unbalanced Pieces". Ce dernier morceau, pleinement trip hop et au refrain complètement tripant, étant un must digne de "Revival". Le très americana Will Oldham est aussi de la partie puisque Mark Lanegan reprend "You Will Miss me When You Burn", superbe piano-voix, alors que Will lui rend la pareille en chantant son "Sunrise", le bonus track.
Si tout ce très lourd vaut son pesant d'or on regrette toutefois la longueur inutile qui étire d'autres morceaux alors que sur deux d'entre eux, l'unique présence d'une chanteuse inconnue, Rosa Agostina du groupe australien Red Ghost, souffre également de la comparaison. Exception faite de son duo avec Mark ("Rolling Sky"), un extraordinaire et apocalyptique jazz-blues au saxophone dissonant. Au long de cette traversée, on ne peut que se rendre à l'évidence du charisme de Mark Lanegan, à la voix immuable et aux chansons protées qui sait aussi bien personnifier un  air de gospel ("All the Way Down") qu'un blues de saloon ("Can't Catch the Train").
Toutefois, on n'oubliera pas que Broken est avant tout un album des Soulsavers. Et si ces deux Britanniques ont trouvé le bon filon à l'ouest en confiant leur exploitation à d'autres c'est aussi parce qu'ils ont le talent de les mettre en avant avec leurs formidables arrangements. Avec quelques guitares en sus, cette étroite association de bienfaiteurs n'a pas fini de faire des heureux sur leur route...

par Marc

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Note :

http://www.banlieuerouge.propagande.org

Origine du Groupe : Canada

Style : Punk Rock Ska

Sortie : 1994

Tracklist :

Sentinelles
Mensonges et trahison
Banlieusards
Tchernobyl
Coyote
Rouge Total
Olaf
Kassandra
Enfants de l'orage
Troïka
Le serment
L'aube sera sombre
Phase Terminale
Triste Rendez-vous
Enterré vivant
Comme une flamme trop forte
L'auberge des trépassés
Cul-de-sac
Otage de l'état
Au coeur de la tempête

Banlieue Rouge était un groupe de punk québécois, qui s'est séparé en 1999

Le groupe s'est formé en 1989 à Longueuil, il était alors composé de Xavier (voix), Francis (guitare), Bastou (basse) et Fish (batterie). Rapidement, le groupe se sépare et Safwan (voix) se joint à Xavier (guitare) et Bastou. La batterie est remplacée par une boîte à rythme. Suite à l'enregistrement de 'En attendant demain', Bastou quitte le groupe. Sylvain (guitare) se joint alors à Safwan et Xavier, qui sera à la basse jusqu'à la séparation de Banlieue Rouge. Jeff (batterie) remplace finalement la boîte à rythme pour compléter la formation que l'on connait aujourd'hui.

Le groupe évolue dans un style punk proche de groupes comme les Bérurier Noir, notamment par l'utilisation d'une boîte à rythme. Par la suite, il évolue vers un punk un peu plus teinté de hardcore.

Les paroles sont très importantes dans Banlieue Rouge. Le groupe s'engage pour l'euthanasie, dénonce la guerre, lutte pour la reconnaissance des droits des amérindiens... Chaque texte est l'occasion de faire passer un message.

Après une bonne décennie à écumer les scènes américaines et européennes, et fort d'une discographie de six albums, le groupe décide de se séparer en 1998. Dans la foulée, Safwan crée Akuma avec Simon. En 2003, Xavier crée Corrigan Fest avec Fred (ex-Shock Troops) et est bientôt rejoint par Sylvain, le guitariste du groupe.

wikipedia

Note :

Origine du Groupe : Ghana

Style : World , Folk

Sortie : 1978

Tracklist :
1 Kill me and fly
2 Onipa retu ne nan
3 Saa na yede beye wo
4 Asem bone se hiani
5 Gyae nkonta buo yi
6 Kusa wo bankye
7 Me wu a mo bebre

I was trying to find me some usefull information on this topic, but Ashanti Brothers Band's album 'Kill me and Fly' seemed ( how about this word ) ungoogleable. The leader of the band's called Osei Vasco, and that's really all I know. Being from 1978, I must say, the vinyl is in very good condition and spins beautiful. And then, the music, I have seldom heard such great highlife, I'm very fund of this sound with warm vocal harmony and hammond organ !

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THANKS Global Groove http://globalgroovers.blogspot.com

Note : ++

http://www.sitesakamoto.com

Origine du Groupe : Japan

Style : Piano , Electro , Ambient , Experimental

Sortie : 2009

Tracklist :

01. Hibari
02. Hwit
03. Still Life
04. In the Red
05. Tama
06. Nostalgia
07. Firewater
08. Disko
09. Ice
10. Glacier
11. To Stanford
12. Composition 0919

As a solo musician for 30 plus years, contributor to the groundbreaking Yellow Magic Orchestra, film composer, and relentless activist, Ryuichi Sakamoto’s body of work embodies a spirit more than it demonstrates an auteurism or trajectory of vision.  Sakamoto started at the peak of technology in the latter half of the 1970s experimenting with synthesizers and sequencers and starting a mini eastern hemispheric revolution by looking at traditional Japanese tonalities through electronics.  In 2009, he’s still on the forward-front of digital development, not only through his latest prolific phase of scores and collaborations with modernists like Alva Noto, Christian Fennesz, and Christopher Willits, but also through his latest deal with iTunes that will see him releasing every single show of his 2009 tour, downloadable online within 24 hours of the event.

The album that the tour is in support of, Out of Noise, Sakamoto’s first full-length solo work in 5 years, is aptly diverse and prescient, yet austere and sullen.  The title is a mystery as the album seems neither carved out of noise nor does it seem to be devoid of it.  Its technology is obscured by the subtlety of its implementation amidst traditional instrumentation and field recordings.  The only exception to this rule is the blissful droning of the wall-of-sound “Firewater”, which show Sakamoto learning a few tricks from his recent Austrian laptop composer partner Fennesz.  Unlike many aging musicians who grow out of touch and out of focus with modern music, Sakamoto’s latest is vibrantly in touch with the sounds of now, particularly the interstition between 20th or 21st century classical and the various post-Eno explorations of non-beat oriented atmospherics.

The album is unexpectedly bookended by what are Out of Noise’s most seemingly extrinsic pieces.  Commencement piece “Hibari” is 9 minutes of a single theme on a piano.  A world apart from minimalism though, the work transposes from a tempered slipknot to an elegant fumble that threatens to, though never succeeds in tripping itself up.  Instead the theme begins looping in odd spots and the tempos of each hand at the keyboard begin to slip away from each other.  The result is familiar sound made unfamiliar by it reconnections and collisions with other familiar sound.  The song’s space becomes hard to track as Sakamoto continues to fill them unexpectedly.

On the opposite end of the album is “Composition 0919”, a piece of Reichian simplicity also confined to the piano that, by contrast, locks both playing hands together in staccato spurts.  The notes ping pong between the left and right speakers and in aggressive movement with practically no low-end variation.  It’s also all-rhythm on an album that seems to repel or discourage said element in the rest of its numbers.

The remainder of the album mostly floats on waves of gentle and often gorgeous liquid ambience.  In fact, the back-to-back duo of “Ice” and “Glacier” are damp and drizzly slow-melting rocks.  Knowing Sakamoto, the leaking throughout “Glacier” is likely a comment on global warming, but beyond the insinuations lies a beautiful polar monolith carved from faint melody, feedback, and incidental noises reverberated sparsely across the icescape.  It’s a bleak loneliness, captured in long-shot as a splendid tragedy.  In its simplicity rests much of its appeal. 

“In the Red” similarly strips down tension and misfortune to a concise communication.  Tremoloed piano chords play in repetition as warm pads swarm in the backdrop and Kranky-style guitars plink scarcely while samples of a small bit of dialogue from an old man are looped and dragged across five minutes.  “I just feel like/ I’m a little lost but/  I’ll be alright”, he says in much slower succession, the final phrase repeating even as the song’s harmonies, a bit like a less ethereal version of recent Harold Budd and Robin Guthrie collaborations, disagree with the assessment of the speaker’s condition.  He finally concludes, at song’s end, “Yeah, I’m alive” with what seems like a sigh of resignation.

Resignation, but not surrender.  When Yellow Magic Orchestra made their comeback album Technodon in 1993, it boldly sounded nothing like the band who put their last album out ten years prior.  At Sakamoto’s age, he could easily surrender to the temptations of churning out just about any kind of retread for drooling fans to swallow, but instead he has put out a thoughtful, quiet album.  Sure, it’s not all as stoically graceful as the tracks described above.  “To Stanford” is hotel jazz probably cropped from a film score Sakamoto was working on and “Nostalgia” is just kind of boring and ineffectual.  Yet, Sakamoto’s aesthetic is such that he remains a towering figure even as the music industry falls and the ice caps melt.  Out of Noise fits neatly into that uncompromising legacy.

By Timothy Gabriele  

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Note : +

http://www.rodrigoleao.pt

http://www.myspace.com/rodrigoleo

Origine du Groupe : Portugal

Style : Ambient, Down-tempo, Chillout, Mod-folk, Contemporary, Piano, Experimental

Sortie : 2004

Tracklist :

01 Cinema 2:41
02 Rosa 4:05
03 Lonely Carousel (feat. Beth Gibbons) 3:34
04 A Comédia de Deus 3:24
05 Jeux D’amour 4:13
06 Memórias 3:36
07 A Cidade Queimada 1:20
08 Deep Blue 4:10
09 Uma História Simples 1:53
10 Happiness 3:12
11 O Último Adeus 1:36
12 La Fête 3:19
13 A Estrada 2:59
14 L’Inspecteur 4:11
15 António 4:19

Rodrigo Leão is a Portuguese musician and composer. He was born in Lisbon in 1964. He became known for his musical compositions and participation in Portuguese bands such as Madredeus and Sétima Legião. He co-founded the band Sétima Legião in 1982 and Madredeus in 1985. As his solo career began to take shape, he chose to suspend his participation with the respective bands in 1993 and 1994. His solo work explores a combination of modern-classic compositions with more traditional song format and instrumentation. Several artists have participated in both his records and tours, such as Lula Pena or Adriana Calcanhotto in Alma Mater and Beth Gibbons and Ryuichi Sakamoto in Cinema. His album, Cinema, was very successful in the Portuguese market, reaching #1 in sales and its promotion concerts in Portugal and Spain were frequently sold-out. In this album, the eclectic roots of his music and the influence of cinema can be appreciated. Ana Vieira is the new member of the group providing the vocals.Neil Hannon participated in the album A Mãe of Rodrigo Leão and Cinema Ensemble..

wikipedia

Note :

http://www.myspace.com/astateofmindproductionz

Origine du Groupe : United Kingdom

Style : Rap Fusion

Sortie : 2010

Tracklist :

01. Age of the Platypus
02. Turnaround feat. Warrior Queen
03. Root to the fruit feat. Wildchild
04. Certified Organic feat. Sadat X
05. Momentum feat. Mr Mattic Kidkanevil et Bonobo
06. Move like this feat. Dj Vadim & Mattic
07. 9-fiddy Number feat. Fredo
08. Vanilla Phillie feat. Stab Berry Weight
09. Guaranteed feat. Wax Tailor
10. Transatlantic feat. Maanumental GP
11. Worldwide
12. Boom To the Bap
13. Simile Soliloquy

Le bon Wax Tailor choisit toujours bien les invités, souvent parmi les artistes indépendants prêts à dévoiler tout leur talent. C'est le cas des rappeurs d'ASM, présents sur les deux derniers disques du producteur français (sur les morceaux Positively Inclined et Say Yes). Ce groupe qui sonnait comme des MC underground américains sort son premier album sur le label de celui qui les a fait connaître. Ceci permet de découvrir qu'ils ont déjà sorti un premier EP en 2007 et, surtout, qu'A State Of Mind réunit en fait un Canadien (Green T) et un Allemand (FP) au micro ainsi qu'un Anglais (Fade) derrière les platines et les machines. Devant un début d'année un peu morne en termes de sorties rap indépendant anglo-saxon, cet album fait figure de bonne surprise. Les bonnes sensations ressenties avec Wax Tailor se confirment en effet avec ce disque aux multiples facettes musicales, une bonne dose de textes bien calibrés et une brochette d'invités bien choisis. Fade sait varier les ambiances en pondant des instrus dynamiques tout à fait adaptés au flow de ses MC. Il peut aussi bien puiser dans le funk (Certified Organic et ses cuivres pêchus) ou dans le reggae (Turnaround et Root To The Fruit) pour offrir un accueil de qualité à Warrior Queen et surtout aux rappeurs Wildchild et à Sadat X qui se posent ici aisément. Le DJ peut aussi laisser la place à d'autres producteurs, à Kidkanevil par exemple pour une piste plus rock (Momentum) ou à Wax Tailor lui même pour un morceau très évolutif (Guaranteed) introduit par quelques samples de voix comme il sait les trouver. Ma préférence ira toutefois à l'instru de DJ Vadim qui a l'audace de réduire le rythme sur Move Like This (avec Mattic au micro), offrant ainsi une respiration bien sentie. Malgré les nombreux invités au micro, on distingue tout à fait Green T et EP et leurs flows dynamiques qui démontrent leur goût pour les anciens comme De La Soul ou A Tribe Called Quest, même si la ressemblance est plus forte avec la bande de Jurassic 5 (notamment sur Transatlantic). Ils sont toujours très à l'aise au micro et leur expérience de la scène leur a apporté une énergie qui accroche sans cesse l'auditeur. Les deux MC allient en effet une technique impeccable avec un côté chantant qui empêche toute monotonie. Avec le son cubain concocté par Fredo sur 9-fiddy Number, on mesure tout le potentiel festif du groupe. Quant à la soul de Worldwide, il apporte une touche plus intime et chaleureuse qui marque les dernières minutes de ce Platypus Funk. Mis à part le titre Vanilla Philie qui semble un peu facile et une fin de disque un peu plus classique, pas grand chose à redire sur ce premier album de très bon niveau.

par Tahiti Raph

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Note :

http://thedynamics.free.fr

http://www.myspace.com/thedynamicsound

Origine du Groupe : France

Style : Reggae , Dub , Soul

Sortie : 2008

Tracklist :

01. The Dynamic Sound
02. Girls And Boys (Prince)
03. Seven Nation Army (The White Stripes)
04. Land Of 1000 Dances (Wilson Pickett)
05. Lay Lady Lay (Bob Dylan)
06. Miss You (Rolling Stones)
07. Rockit (Herbie Hancock)
08. Brothers On The Slide (Cymande)
09. 90 Percent Of Me Is You (Gwen McCrae)
10. Whole Lotta Love (Led Zeppelin)
11. Feel Like Making Love (Roberta Flack)
12. The Creator Has A Masterplan (Pharoah Sanders)
13. Fever (Elvis Presley)
14. Move On Up (Curtis Mayfield)

By salt

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Note : +

http://www.burkina-electric.com

http://www.myspace.com/burkinaelectric

Origine du Groupe : Burkina Faso , North America

Style : Electro World , Fusion , Alternative

Sortie : 2010

Tracklist :

01. Gom Zanga 5:23

02. Sankar Yaarй 5:32
03. Naab Koobo 4:55
04. Mdolй 5:37
05. Ligdi 6:37
06. La Voix Du Boulgou 5:38
07. Bobo Yenguй 5:01
08. To Mi To Zi 5:49
09. Saaga 5:45

10. Nongui Taaba 5:53
11. Bana 4:51
12. Ca Va Chauffer 6:24

Burkina Electric’s PR hook is that they are Burkina Faso’s (a land-locked West African nation formerly known as Upper Volta) first electronica band. This ignores several inconvenient points; that most of the band lives most of the time in Brooklyn and one member lives in Germany, that Burkina Faso has a robust hip hop scene that is no stranger to electronic beats, and that electronica has to be one of the most meaningless tags on earth. But the group’s name does clue you in to their music’s rootedness in the traditions of Burkina Faso, the homeland of four of BE’s members, and their predominantly plugged-in sound.

Percussionist/composer/improviser Lukas Ligeti (son of Gyorgy) is the group’s lynchpin; he and German electronician (and D.A.F./Der Plan vet) Kurt “Pyrolator” Dahlke had first met BE’s Burkinabè (denizens of Burkina) during a 1994 sojourn in the Ivory Coast, and gave them all a call a decade later when an Austrian cultural organization invited him to put a tour together that involved electronics and the music of Burkina Faso. They gelled on that tour and ultimately solidified into a six-piece group that includes Ligeti, Pyrolator singer Maï Lingani, guitarist Wende K. Blass, background singer-dancers “As” Zoko Zoko and “Vicky” Idrissa Kafando.

Burkina Electric consider themselves “post-intercultural,” a notion that nicely skirts familiar Afro-pop paradigms. The African musicians aren’t hired hands backing well-heeled Westerners, nor are they required to adhere to old-fashioned traditional styles that no one wants to hear back home, nor have they gone to Paris to try and cramp their styles into an existing World Music marketing niche. BE’s music sounds like the outcome of a free exchange between the non-Africans, who handle all the keyboards and rhythms, Lingani’s flexible, poly-lingual singing, and Wende’s son-of-soukous picking. Ligeti is sufficiently steeped in African rhythm lore to keep the music from sounding like a streamlined hybrid. In fact, the grooves are least interesting when they are most obviously Western, such as the drably familiar slow-jam “Saaga” and the gaseous electro-funk beat that dominates the first part of “Ligdi.” “Ca Va Chauffer,” on the other hand, feels like a genuine mix, especially during the break where layers of hand percussion overlay the thumping bass and lilting guitar, and “Sankar Yaaré” achieves a similarly successful mix with punched-in guitar samples.

Paspanga is a pretty choppy listen and at best a qualified success, but it wouldn’t be nearly as appealing with any other singer. Lingani not only sounds equally committed to the adapted traditional folk tales and the would-be dance-club bangers, she’s got the chops to authoritatively deliver both and the charisma to make you pay attention. She can’t save every dud, but she never sounds like she doesn’t believe in what she’s doing.

By Bill Meyer

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Note : +

http://www.eost.cz

http://www.myspace.com/eost

Origine du Groupe : Czech Republic

Style : Trip Hop , Electro

Sortie : 2006

Tracklist :

01. To Work On My Sleep Schedule
02. V.R.!
03. Wrong Time, Wrong Place
04. Gun And The Stars
05. Watching Black White Looking
06. I'm The Exploding
07. Trash About
08. O.K. (Even If It Doesn't Sound Like)
09. Immortality
10. Hit By Cyclist
11. BarbWire

The Ecstasy of Saint Theresa is a rare band. In their own unique way, they have always attempted to find their own sound and expression with which they have jointly dictated the direction of alternative music in their homeland of the Czech Republic. The band’s cult status there was primarily acquired through strong, emotional music that was open to various influences. (Last.fm)

Note :

http://www.badiassad.com

http://www.myspace.com/badiassad

Origine du Groupe ; Brazil

Style : World Music , Alternative ,Folk , Vocal

Sortie : 2005

Tracklist :

1. Cheguei Meu Povo
2. Asa Branca [Interlude]
3. Básica [De Blusinha Branca]
4. Não Adianta
5. One
6. Voce Não Entendeu Nada
7. Viola, Meu Bem
8. O Verde É Maravilha
9. Feminina
10. Bachelorette
11. Seu Delegado
12. Estrangeiro Em Mim
13. Bom Dia Tristeza
14. The Being Between [Daruma]
15. Valse d’Amélie
16. Implorando
17. In My Little White Top [Básica]

The exotic, one of a kind Brazilian guitarist, singer, and rhythmic mouth and body percussionist has had a stop-and-start career with turns as mysterious and intriguing as her music. After splashing on the scene with her Chesky debut Solo in 1994, continuing the stir (including vast critical acclaim) with Rhythms (1995) and releasing Chameleon on Verve in 1997, Badi Assad suffered from a series of personal issues that drew her back home for a few years. Fans who were excited about her 2003 re-emergence on the trio date Three Guitars with Larry Coryell and John Abercrombie will be beside themselves with the long-awaited Verde, her first solo project in six years. Those expecting a typical Brazilian vocal album -- she explains the title as "the shades of the Brazilian rain forest" -- will be surprised by Assad's versatility, which incorporates rhythmic textures from around the world. She opens with the very African-flavored voice and dense percussion call-and-response "Cheguei Meu Povo" and a vocal percussion pitter patter interlude before tapping into a sound more typical of classic romantic samba ("Basica"). That sultry side is balanced by her more aggressive vocal and guitar on the feisty "Nao Adianta," which blends modern rock influences with indigenous soundscaping, complete with birdcalls. Other tracks have slight classical leaning, and there's even a little avant-garde oddity apparent on the brief "Feminina." More mainstream ears will be glued to her sly, sexy reading of U2's "One" and soaring, folk- and chamber music-tinged take on Björk's dramatic "Bachelorette," which further confirms Assad's incredible willingness to tackle exotic challenges. Though all the stylistic zigzagging is fascinating, Assad is first and foremost a vocalist of heartbreaking intensity, and tracks like the mournful "Bom Dia Tristeza" best reflect her ability to penetrate the heart.

By Jonathan Widran

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