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