This week I had a lot of fun going through the archives, and I came up with what I think are a few gems. The standout is Chris Montez, an American singer of Mexican origin who popped back into my consciousness thanks to Boing Boing. The two singles I played were “Call Me” and “The More I See You,” both of which are wonderfully sunlit pop songs.
Here’s the set list in Google Docs format. See you in two weeks for the first set of 2009.
This week I had the good luck of finding two outstanding music sites, the Sir Shambling site and Loronix. Sir Shambling is a British record collector who has an astounding collection of soul music, where Loronix specializes in out-of-print Brazilian rarities. Both have lots of music linked from the site.
This week’s standout new track was probably “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feeling,” by the Lebron Brothers, which of course covers the Righteous Brothers (my dad was in a car club in LA with one of the Righteous Brothers, but that’s another story). The cover is one of those where you’re not sure if it’s brilliant or gawdawful. Either way, it stands out. It came as part of a larger boogaloo and soul set in the third hour.
I first heard Brazilian singer Claudia’s single “Deixa eu Dizer” on the Blue Note compilation “Blue Brazil 3,” but Loronix has the entire album, which is outstanding. Claudia also appears on the Nicola Conte compilation “Viagem” on Blue Note. I played two by Claudia, “Agora quem Ri Sou Eu” from “Deixa eu Dizer” and “Gusto Deser Como Sou” from Viagem.
By the way, Nicola Conte is coming to the Palac Akropolis on 29 January 2009. I’m really looking forward to that.
Naked Music’s “Re-creation” was pretty good too. That came out in July, but I’ve only now gotten hold of it.
Here is the link to this week’s setlist via Google Docs.
I sure do wish we could put these shows out as podcasts, but so far the Radio 1 management has resisted the idea. Maybe someday. Ach jo…
This week’s show had a couple of standout new releases: Stephane Pompougnac’s Hotel Costes 11 was one of them, but the absolute winner was Alice Russell’s “Pot of Gold,” which blew me away. Her cover of Gnarls Barkley’s ‘Crazy’ was absolutely stunning.
Here’s this week’s setlist, for those keeping score at home.
This week’s show had a whole lot of new material, including the excellent “Rituals” by Nicola Conte, “Ninja Tuna” by Mr. Scruff, “Fried Samba” by Malena, “Radio Free DC” by the Fort Knox Five and “Radio Retaliation” by Thievery Corporation. Whew. Plus there’s that outstanding new Jazzanova single, “Let Me Show Ya.” I really can’t wait for the new Jazzanova CD to drop on Thursday.
Here is the setlist from this week’s show. Click the link to open it in Google Spreadsheets format.
This week’s show was devoted almost exclusively to music from today’s South African scene, with an emphasis on house, Afropop, hip-hop, kwaito and jazzier sounds. It was definitely pleasant to spend time in such a vibrant music scene, and to get to drop in on the Moshito music conference was icing on the cake.
There were so many standouts this week, but my personal favorites would have to be Khethi’s “Xemplify”, Zubz’ “Headphone Music from Parallel Worlds” and Tumi’s “Music From My Good Eye.”
Anyway, here’s the setlist from this week. Many thanks go to Diane Regisford, Gerrard Foster and DJ Casper for their guidance and generosity with the various music provided.
This week’s set focused a lot on the groove, with my personal favorites being Eddie Harris’ “Listen Here” and Nina Simone’s scorching version of “Mood Indigo.” It’s good to be back in the habit of doing my show after the summer break. I’m also looking forward to getting my hands on the new Yvonne Sanchez and Sabrina Malheiros records, if I can.
I’ll also be heading to South Africa, where I’ll be leading workshops on radio broadcasting for African journalists as part of the annual Highway Africa conference at Rhodes University in Grahamstown, but will be back in time for my show on the 13th.
Here’s this week’s setlist as a Google spreadsheet.
This week the standout new tracks were from Jair Oliveira’s ‘Simples’. But this was the week Orchestra Baobab played the Lucerna Music Bar, so I had to play a couple of tracks from their classic album ‘Pirate’s Choice.’ But truth be told, I’m still loving the ‘Nicola Conte Presents Viagem’ compilation.
Click here for this week’s setlist.
This week’s show is the last until August; I’m traveling on business a week from now, and then right after that I’m headed on vacation to California, so there’ll be a long pause. But I do hope to bring back lots of new music then.
