Formed in New York City by drummer and programmer Tamir Muskat and ex-Gogol Bordello member Ori Kaplan, Balkan Beat Box teamed with several talented composers, extraordinary musicians and singers to bring us their second album Nu-Med, a rich blend of electronic, gypsy horns, klezmer, jazz, funk, hip-hop, dub and Arab music, which really does not fit the obnoxious “world” label.
The main ingredient here is that marvelous horn section that combined with electronic sounds make us feel that there’s a neighborhood between Cairo, New York City, Mexico City, Tel-Aviv and Sarajevo where we all could go and let ourselves go, and by dancing we could forget that there are borders.
So Nu-Med by Balkan Beat Box is our monthly selection because, an album that makes such a coherent fusion of so many styles in such a wonderful manner, deserves a place in your collection.

We’ve always shown a particular interest in how technology affects the way that we create or perceive music, therefore we must acknowledge the next issues:
Today everybody can make music without any previous knowledge of notation or even sophisticated studio equipment.
Technology has changed the whole music distribution system with the use of the mp3 codec and P2P networks.
Virtual communities such MySpace, or YouTube are breaking the schemes of the, once constricted, music industry.
And finally, some artists don’t even sing well anymore, audio engineers use special software and fancy machines to fix their faulty voices.

Now, imagine for a minute what could be going on next in this unpredictable music evolution.
We want to share with you some outstanding ideas that may be real in the near future.

1.- Virtual Singers

Today this is not a dream, Myriad Software has developed “Virtual Singer” which is a module for Melody/Harmony Software, some of the features are: each singer can be fine-tuned, by modifying its timbre, intonation or voice pitch (man, women, child, tenor, soprano, etc.) besides these features, several different voices will be able to sing at the same time, in several languages: British English, American English, French, German, Latin, Spanish, Italian, Japanese, Finnish, Occitan. Also Virtual Singer includes the Real Singer II technology: you can create a voice from recordings of your own voice.
This module is a great tool if you want to sketch vocals in a track, unfortunately it still sounds like a synthetic robot voice, but in a few years this kind of technology could easily be more organic and accurate compared to the human voice… or why not? you will even be able to sculpt a perfect voice or emulate voices of dead singers like James Brown, Sinatra or Ella Fitzgerald.

2.- Random Compositions and Improvisations

Imagine that you are a piano player who is making an improvisation, wouldn’t it be fantastic that you have the according harmonies and percussions depending which notes and scales you are playing along?
According to scientist Stephen Wolfram this is possible using simple music theory and mathematics algorithms and rendering them as music, and in fact, he has some experiments online, check out the Wolfram Tones example.

3.-Finally the idea of how you interact with music to play an instrument

As you can see in the reactable video interaction with devices is turning into unexpected ways, to complement this issue you have to read the story of researchers at Johns Hopkins University, who are developing a neural interface that will allow a virtual hand to play the piano, in fact they are making experiments with monkeys beacause it isn’t perfected yet to be used by humans, nevertheless the researchers are planning a live demonstration within the next six months, my question now is will the monkey be playing the Five Little Monkeys?

As you can see there’s a lot technological development going on, getting perfected and ready to take the following step, I hope this new wave of advantages will not restrain creativity on human beings… as Isaac Asimov once said “Leave for humans the creative tasks”.

Based on the Classic Albums series made by Isis & Eagle Rock Entertainment of an idea devised by John Pidgeon and Roger Scott, that feature documentaries of well-known rock, hip-hop and pop albums, we’ve decided to make our own selection of what we consider Classic Albums, trying not to fall into the same routine works that we see constantly in these selections, such as Radiohead’s OK Computer, Nirvana’s Nevermind, The Who’s Who’s Next or Sir Elton John’s Goodbye Yellow Brick Road. Our list, however, contains albums that you should seriously consider adding to your record collection, since it’s never too late to own a masterpiece.

So first we are compiling our list and publishing it, but don’t forget that lists are organic, never definitive. We might be forgetting some outstanding works, so, feel free to contribute.

On second hand we’ll be reviewing these albums little by little.

Finally, here’s our list:

A Tribe Called Quest - The Low End Theory
The Afghan Whigs - Gentlemen
Air - Moon Safari
Arrested Development - 3 Years, 5 Months & 2 Days In The Life Of…
Astor Piazolla with Gary Burton - The New Tango
Aterciopelados - Caribe Atómico
The Avalanches - Since I Left You
Basement Jaxx - Remedy
Bebel Gilberto - Tanto Tempo
Björk - Debut
Bran Van 3000 - Glee
Buffalo Daughter - New Rock
Café Tacuba - Re
Can - Tago Mago
The Chemical Brothers - Dig Your Own Hole
The Church - Starfish
Cornelius - Point
Crowded House - Temple Of Low Men
Daft Punk - Homework
Dimitri From Paris - Sacrebleu
Duran Duran - Rio
Emiliana Torrini - Love In The Time Of Science
Erykah Badu - Baduizm
Esquivel - Space-Age Bachelor Pad Music*
Etienne De Crecy - Etienne De Crecy Presents Super Discount
Everything But The Girl - Walking Wounded
Frederic Galliano - Espaces Baroques
Frente! - Marvin The Album
The Future Sound Of London - Dead Cities
Goldie - Timeless
Gotan Project - La Revancha Del Tango
Gus Gus - Polydistortion
Los Lobos - Kiko
Mano Negra - Casa Babylon
Massive Attack - Mezzanine
MC Solaar - Prose Combat
Moby - Play
Mono - Formica Blues
Neneh Cherry - Homebrew
Nicola Conte - Bossa Per Due
OutKast - Stankonia
PJ Harvey - Rid Of Me
Paris Combo - Living Room
Phoenix - United
Photek - Form & Function
Pizzicato Five - Made In USA
Portishead - Dummy
Les Rhytmes Digitales - Darkdancer
Röyksopp - Melody A.M.
Saint Etienne - Foxbase Alpha
Serge Gainsbourg - Historie De Melodie Nelson
Sergio Mendes & Brasil ‘66 - Herb Alpert Presents Sergio Mendes & Brasil ‘66
Sidestepper - 3 AM (In Beats We Trust)
Sigur Rós - Ágætis Byrjun
Scissor Sisters - Scissor Sisters
Stereolab - Emperor Tomato Ketchup
Steve Reich - Variations*
Soundgarden - Superunknown
Suba - São Paulo Confessions
Telefon Tel Aviv - Fahrenheit Fair Enough
Tom Tom Club - Tom Tom Club
Tori Amos - Little Earthquakes
Towa Tei - Sound Museum
Underworld - Beaucoup Fish
Ursula 1000 - Kinda Kinky
Weezer - Weezer (Blue)
Willie Colón & Rubén Blades - Siembra
Yonderboi - Shallow And Profound
Zap Mama - A Ma Zone
Zero 7 - Simple Things

*OK, these are compilations, but they are assembled in a perfectly coherent album.