The thing that I worship about James Di Salvio’s collective is the same thing that most critics crucify: A broad eclectic style, but that is just the key that unveils Di Salvio’s indisputable love for music. I rather listen to 20 Bran Van 3000’s albums in a row, than 3 by any other band with a “clearly defined style”, since I have always thought that listening to a same style for hours numbs your hearing and can produce brain fatigue, the tricky part is that, at BV3k’s current rate, 66 years must pass in order to produce 20 albums, but I wasn’t writing to lament on the low quantity but instead to focus on the high quality of their latest production: Rosé.

Their third album in a decade is a sonic collage that swings from tree to tree of genres with such a gracious method, nurturing mainly on reggae, hip-hop and electronic sounds but adding some guitar riffs, funk and the beautiful voice of co-producer Sara Johnston to the mix. The collectif montréalais use the same formula again and manage to deliver a carefully produced piece that came out on the last days of 2007 and was picked as our first selection this year.

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.

The Sea and Cake is a magnificent indie-rock band comprised of 4 very talented and notable musicians from the Chicago indie-rock scene:
Archer Prewitt, who is an incredible guitarist and member of the soft-rock band The Coctails.
John McEntire, who is an experimented drummer, he’s also been member of many influential post-rock bands like Gastr Del Sol, Tortoise, Bastro, Stereolab, Cougar, and Trans Am, and, complementing his background, he is a good producer and also a meticulous audio engineer.
Eric Claridge, the bassist who’s also a painter and an illustrator, made, in this effort, an extraordinary collaboration with the arrangements, his bass lines always make a perfect match with the rest of each song, no matter how asymmetrical the melodies will result.
And the leader of the band and the characteristic sweet voice that is portrayed by Sam Prekop, who made two extraordinary solo albums when The Sea and Cake was on reconstruction, in fact, last year we reviewed his debut record which is a listening delight.

This month we’ve chosen Everybody, their last achievement, as Album of The Month for many reasons, one of them is because they blend a lot of colors, in a elegant and organic way, in a single work, they’ve also included a lot seventies music textures like those vintage synths and a little psychedelia, similar but softer than Yo La Tengo’s creations, in addition they re-framed the structure of the songs, previously they have used a very tight and static model, now they’ve created more complex and dynamic tracks, fortunately they’ve evolved and they took chances to make something much more creative and integral. You can feel they have made an incredible connection that sparkled the right bright and balance of every instrument and every effect.

Some insipid reviewers compare Everybody with the previous recordings by Prekop, that’s just false, I agree that some of the songs keep the use of smooth sounds, but I’m sure that one of the main goals of the band was to create something really different and original, in comparison with their previous works, you just have to listen closely. Nevertheless it would be fantastic if Sam Prekop some day ventures in changing his usual vocal stucture that could be a trademark or an obstacle in considering new possibilities, or why not? even looking for a female colaboration like Ivy’s Dominique Durand, she could be a interesting option …for example.

Everybody has to listen to this masterpiece, some critics indicate that is an album for “everybody” and in some cases they even catalogued it as a pop album, I don’t quite think so, it is a rock album as well, and a carefully well-done recording, the only thing that I would object about is the cover, why would anyone that made such a colorful and rich production, choose that grayscale cover? Nevermind.

One of the most expected albums of this year might be Björk’s sixth studio album Volta, so we forced ourselves to make an objective and impartial review, although as a Björk fan I think that it would be a difficult task.

When Björk announced the release of an album that will pick up again the beats issue, a lot of us were impatient to finally know how she could sound like, because she is always in the innovation terrain with almost everything that she puts her mind on.

So, let’s start talking about Volta with the list of the professional musicians who Björk invited this time:
Antony Hegarty (from Antony And The Johnsons), unfortunately he is on two tracks, in my opinion he’s the worst collaborator that she has ever chosen. Is not that Hegarty’s music is bad is just that both tracks on Volta are insipid and flat, the usual innovation level here is simply in a hidden place. I don’t really think his voice makes a match with the vocalization of the Icelandic lady.
Timbaland, the famous producer who materialized the percussion section for three songs, brings back those fantastic Isobel’s tribal beats.
Mark Bell, which is an extraordinary electronic producer and member of LFO, he’s guilty for the bass lines, low frequencies and strange sounds on Volta.
Chris Corsano and Brian Chippendale, both outstanding drummers they complement the Volta recipe by adding a unique flavor to the beats.
Toumani Diabate, which is a talented kora player from Congo who won the BBC World Music Award last year, his collaboration is one the best here.
10 piece female brass section from iceland, who helped Björk in creating the orchestration to obtain sweet and emotive chords.
Min Xiao-Fen, which is a chinese pipa player, her collaboration is extraordinary and emphasizes the fact that Björk was again experimenting and looking for new sounds.

Björk, describes Volta as techno voodoo, pagan, tribal and extroverted. For me, the most significant word is “extroverted” because Björk in her previous efforts sang with such a sweetness and tenderness, like someone in love, and some songs were almost children’s lullabies. For this album it was not only the return of strong beats, but also she was determined to be impulsive. I guess that is a better way to focus her energy, singing, instead of showing her bad temper, remember that she lives violently happy, after all. All this impulse and playfulness was reflected on three songs: Earth Intruders, Innocence and Declare Independence, the latter simply breaks her own recent rule of creating tender songs, resulting in a recording so extroverted and full of energy that she seems to be singing a revelation song or giving an alarm call, and it is something like that, because her message is “Start your own currency! Make your own stamp! Protect your language!”

Volta is entirely written and produced by Björk so that could be one of the reasons for not resulting in a homogenous album (or should I say homogenic?), Volta might be considered Björk’s most mirthful and risky experiment, she combined so many flavors, so many beat textures, so organic frequencies and samples, that she created a unique collage of electro-worldmusic. I hope for the next records this experimentation will be expanded towards other countries and collaborators, imagine a Björk album using latin beats, it could be marvelous, I hope one day that happens.

After listening scrupulously to the album more that 6 times with my headphones, I have to say that this album is magnificently well done, I especially love Hope, in my opinion is, by far, the best track… nevertheless it is not my favorite Björk album, possibly –maybe– I was expecting another kind of surprise. So go and get one copy for you, so you can built your own opinion, try to buy Volta on the original Special Edition CD, the artwork is extraordinary, and the audio is way much better than if you download it from rapidshare or elsewhere.

Our Album of the month this time is a world premiere, Lanu - This Is My Home beacause it is an innovative, fresh and a breakthrough soundpiece, blending soulful grooves with a punchy Moog bassline, angular Rhodes chords and an emphatic break. It is like if you have bribed the jury to set those sound landscapes free, in fact I can’t get out of my head those magnificent choirs.

Lanu’s productions have received chartlistings and radio play from key tastemakers including: Gilles Peterson (Worldwide, BBC Radio 1), Patrick Forge, Jazzanova, Afronaught, Straight No Chaser Magazine, Quantic, Nicola Conte, Nik Weston,, Rainer Truby, Ennio Styles, Keb Darge, Simon Harrison, John Kong, Paul Murphy and Snowboy.

Lance Ferguson a.k.a. Lanu was born in New Zealand he is know for his guitar skills in the famous deep funk band The Bamboos and is the co-founder of Melbourne’s Local People and Equatorial labels, whose releases had put Melbourne on the map for a vast amount of quality, soulful club-music.

Check out Lanu’s fortnightly online radio show here.
And also download this DJ Mix, featuring Lanu, Seiji & Amp Fidder.

Balún is an extraordinary band from San Juan, Puerto Rico formed by Angélica Negrón, José Olivares and Andrés Fontánez, and there is something extremely contradictory with their country of origin and their music, their music is the complete opposite to the accustomed music of that particular island, it sounds nothing like bomba, reggaeton or salsa, Balún simply broke the rule by creating unwarm but sweet music, in my opinion this is truly the feature that makes the over-all concept a bit more interesting, in fact their sound tends to be like the sonority of Múm, Rumpistol or some of those bands from nordic countries, their music is full of electronic textures, cold atmospheres, angelic but also melancholic melodies and even some lullaby bits, they auto describe their sound with an amusing concept: “we sound like whatever you want us to sound like”, the concept is quite original, as their music.

Coming from a flourishing music scene in San Juan that also include Superaquello, Balún released they their debut album on May, 2006 with Brilliante Records, which is a little record label based on Chicago, today they have a busy agenda playing mainly on the United States, I think that they never imagined the unbelievable success and acceptation they’ll get.

Allmusic named Balún as the most innovative band of 2006, this award only validates that all their talent and their effort could be acknowledged by the right people, and, because of that, Balún - Something Comes Our Way is our album of the month, I’ll guess that they are going to release an album this year, well, I’m hoping so.

As you can see there’s a new player for our traditional album of the month, we hope this tool helps in promoting our favorite music in a powerful manner, so I suggest that, while you read these lines, don’t be shy and play one of the songs, we also have on the right side a few recommendations that you can listen as well.So, let’s go on, well… What can I say about this magnificent album called “Koop Islands” is one of the most sophisticated albums I’ve ever listened to, Koop is a duo from Sweden formed by Oscar Simonsson and Magnus Zingmark, they began in 1996 innovating with their peculiar style of jazz, if you listen to their past albums like Waltz For Koop you can discover some happy tunes along side with some complicated jazz arrangements, one of the most notable differences between their last effort and this one is the retrospective layers in the sounds, this one transports us back to the 30’s and brings us back the soul of those large orchestras, with a contemporary point of view. The sweetness and beauty of Yukimi Nagano is the cherry on top, as you can see in this video. The other thing that I love in Koop Islands is the warmness of the album, the sounds are very organic and soft maybe because of the selection of the instruments: marimbas and wind instruments create a unique texture, marimba is not the kind of instrument that is common to be listened to in these genres, maybe is one of the reasons we publish the Instruments of the Month, we spot some not-usual instruments to help people open their minds to new frequencies and sounds, in conclusion you should add Koop - Koop Islands to your music collection.

I’m not really sure why they dress like women in almost all the photos, I suspect that’s a funny way to promote themselves, anyway, the answer doesn’t matter at all, their music rules!

By the way, in their official website you can read that If you listen very carefully you can hear the Number 4 bus go by on the snowy street outside their tiny studio in Stockholm’s Södermalm, I’ve listened a lot to this album but I can’t notice that detail, could anybody tell us where or in which track?

P.S. Merry Christmas

Our selection for album of the month this time is Sabrina Malheiros’ Vibrasons, this magnificent album is an excellent collection of remixes of her songs. Sabrina is an outstanding brazilian singer who has a vast heritage beacause of Alex Malheiros, her father, who is a bass player from the legendary Brazilian band Azymuth. Her grandfather played with Sergio Mendes and was the first Brazilian to manufacture an electric bass, she also studied music when she was 6 years old, and by the time she was 12, she had made her recording debut singing lead vocals on the title track of Azymuth’s 1991 album, Curumim!

All this knowledge and effort has given her the possibility to work with great artists, like the japanese Acid Jazz act United Future Organization when she was just 19, after that she recorded 4 songs for a movie soundtrack included there was the highly successful track, Dancing in Rio with Paulo Williams.

On her debut album Equilibria the sound contains mainly Brazilian sambas and bossas, all the melodies and rythms reflect in some way a little piece of the musical roots of Brazil but at the same time sounds contemporary and elegant, this extraordinary album was so great that it was screaming for for a remix, so some great artists and producers were involved in creating incredible remixes, people like: Kenny Dope, Quantic, Nicola Conte, Boston Rodríguez, Max Cole, Spiritual South and many more, therefore it is not a collection for DJ’s beacuse there are too much styles and tempos each one of them contributing with their personal trademark, and also compiling Sabrina’s tracks to build up an ultra-rhythmic and sophisticated compendium.

Sabrina explains, “Vibrasons is a play on words, it’s a combination of Vibração (vibrations) and Sons (sounds). I love all the remixes as they breathe new life into the tracks.”

Despite being just 23 years old, Will Holland started his career as a young producer and musician, he already had 2 records full of funk and jazz influences “Mishaps Happening” and “Pushin’ On” these ones rapidly became part of the BBC stations tracklists. In order to make his sound so rich and inventive he tries to be very close to his music, in some cases he plays guitar, bass and sax, so he is definetly a one-man orchestra.For his last creating effort he started a journey with just with a laptop and a very strongly defined concept, he went all the way to San Juan in Puerto Rico, Nigeria, Benin, Ghana and Ethiopia to collect samples, instrument sounds and voices. Among the guests included in his album are Noelle Scaggs from The Rebirth, Ohmega Watts and the Puerto Rican percussionist Tempo, which was a member of the marvelous Fania All-Stars. The result is a multiflavored record; every track has its own personality, but at the same time it sounds as a part of a whole, in my opinion this is very hard to obtain within an album, maybe that’s the main reason that it was chosen as album of the month.

After hearing some tracks, it came to my mind the belgian producer Buscemi, maybe because Buscemi and Quantic dare to explore those hidden roots of African music.
And, by the way, if you look at the dictionary you will find that Quantic means: “a homogenous polynomial having two or more variables” this definition works very accurately to define this album.

I hope you enjoy this album as much as I do.

Mathew Herbert is one of the most versatile and innovative musicians in the United Kingdom, he has contributed to the works of artists like Björk, R.E.M., Róisín Murphy, Yoko Ono and Serge Gainsbourg, he has also created a technique named P.C.C.O.M. (his “Personal Contract for the Composition Of Music” that incorporates “The Manifesto of Mistakes”), the result of this technique, is awesome, we could say that he dares to be some kind of alchemist, beacuse he achieves a perfect transgression of genres, from a big-band woodwind swing orchestra to subsonic basses that create a fantastic and uncategorized recording, Herbert defines this record as a celebration, and he really made that, we can even compare it with a musical composition by, e.g., Dani Siciliano who usually sings sadder tones of music, and the arrangements create a sweet and energetic atmosphere, almost like pop.

In my opinion Scale is one of Herbert’s most lucid dreams and, at the same time, a consolidation as a respected icon in the music scene, definitely this album is a masterpiece, not only beacause the arrangements and the production, which is pefectly done, he also renewed musical compositions in a flexible and amusing way.

Scale is one of the most expected albums of this year, for that facts is our july album of the month