Mulatu Astatke – “Tezeta” [1998]

Posted on February 28, 2018 by Very Warm

I thought for the final post of # Warm Visions February I would end things on a grand slam. Many folks probably know this song, but if you don’t then dang – you’re in for a treat. Mulatu Astatke is an Ethiopian jazz musician, possibly the most famous one. For good reason – his songs are incredibly accessible even to an ultra-casual fan of jazz, and it’s just so dang lovely.

I actually was turned onto this guy by Eric Andre’s “What’s In My Bag” Amoeba video from a few years back. He described Ethiopian jazz as “funky but also really cumbersome” and then didn’t follow it up with an audio preview, so I had to check it out. Sure enough, Eric was right, to a degree. The faster paced songs are definitely funky and kind of junky at the same time, but the slower, smoother songs is where the dreaminess comes in.

On personal terms, this record (Ethiopiques 4) was one of the main tools I used to get through my incredibly stressful final semester of college. That and Sun Araw and my friends and my partner. It’s a really important album to me and I hope you find some personal light in it as well.

And I mean, if you’re still only on the indie rock bandwagon (at this point, why are you reading my blog? I’m trying to get you to branch out), Fleet Foxes sampled this song at the end of a song on Crack-Up, and King Gizzard And The Lizard Wizard named a song after this on Sketches Of Brunswick East. I also saw Nai Palm of Hiatus Kaiyote perform solo and she gave Astatke and this song a shout out. I was the only one in the venue who screamed in recognition. There are probably plenty more references out there, but these are the ones I know. It’s a trusted brand. Even past that, you need to listen.

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Toshiki Kadomatsu – “Airport Lady” [1984]

Posted on February 27, 2018 by Very Warm

We’re quickly approaching the end of the month, so I thought I’d end the spree of posts on a superhot note, while still continuing the theme of city pop. I’ve put up some bangers on here, but very few reach the level that “Airport Lady” achieves.

To be honest, the rest of this album is just OK. The real tenderloin – the real cream – the real good stuff is this track right here. It features excellent use of slap bass, swells of backup singers, an orchestra and horn section, as well as some glitzy drum machines and synthesizers. It’s basically everything that comes with the mental association with excessive 80s pop music. It’s perfect, especially for driving. I slapped this on while I was back in my hometown and ready for some light driving around town and holy smokes, I was lighting up the wilderness of Connecticut with this major heat, I tell you what.

Listen to the whole album HERE.

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A.A.L. (Against All Logic) – “Some Kind Of Game” [2018]

Posted on February 26, 2018 by Very Warm

The city sidewalks are sequencers and drum machines.

Nicolas Jaar’s Against All Logic project dropped an album last week that I just got around to listening to, and damn – it’s fire. It’s much more akin to his live material, which was predominantly house. I recognized a few cuts he played then while going through this album, so it was nice to finally connect the dots on where the songs align in his discography. The whole album is great, but “Some Kind Of Game” was by and far my highlight. If you’re looking for some lo-fi leaning, soul-sampling, drum heavy house, this is a good place to cut loose.

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Guernica – ‘新世紀への運河 (Canal To The New Century)’ [1988]

Posted on February 25, 2018 by Very Warm

For the uninitiated, I am very happy to present to you one of the wildest records I’ve ever listened to. It’s Guernica, the industrial revolution concept pop band from 1980s Japan, and their record 新世紀への運河, or Canal To The New Century, recorded in 1988.

Right from the start it hits you with a massive sucker punch – it is here where you will either buy in or sell out. The theatrical nature vocals, the mixture of magnificent, overwhelming orchestral arrangements and the sharp shifts in mood… If you aren’t into it from the get-go, you likely won’t find anything noteworthy here. However, I implore you to stick it out, since it will seriously transport you to a world unlike any other.

Later I plan on looking into this album more since it’s so intriguing, but for now I want you to just listen to it. Tell me what you think. The full album is a little over 30 minutes. Just put it on, don’t think about anything else and just let it take you on its weird, hallucinatory, steam-powered journey.

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El Polen – “A Las Orillas Del Vilcanota” [1973]

Posted on February 24, 2018 by Very Warm

El Polen’s fantastic record Fuera De La Ciudad was one of my first worldly discoveries I made while on the hunt for new music and one of the main sparkplugs that has fueled my desire to continue finding buried gold (well, maybe not so buried anymore, but still relatively obscure) and bring it to the surface for friends and the like to enjoy.

El Polen was a psychedelic rock band from Peru who made the record in question on a pilgrimage-esque trip into the Andes, specifically to Cuzco. There they let their hippie freak flag fly and made a record that they felt connected to the more natural setting they found themselves in and tapped into something really special. It feels loose and free, much like a celebration of life and nature. Not only in the personality of the band bleeding through in every track, but in the way the songs are arranged and performed. It all feels balanced: each performer ebbing and flowing with the other. It this was all just a ploy to appear rootsy and connected, they succeeded.

I say it every time I post something here – but this album is really something special. I first heard it in 2012 and I’ve constantly revisited it. Heck, I even bought a CD remaster for $40 that came with a poster and two extra tracks. This album means a lot to me and I hope you enjoy it.

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Yoshiko Sai – “冬の地下道” (Fuyu no Chikadō) [1975]

Posted on February 23, 2018 by Very Warm

More and more gold always coming in from my music mining expeditions of old Japan. If you’re immersed in new music as much as I am, an appropriate RIYL for this would be Weyes Blood. Very similar timbre to their voices and theatric nature to their instrumental.

If I remember correctly from reading this somewhere, I feel like Yoshiko Sai wasn’t a very popular artist in Japan at the time when she was releasing albums. As in, she made these immaculate folk rock records and no one really paid attention to it. We really live in a miraculous time where a music blog like mine, for instance, can find this stuff and repost it to continue its legacy. It’s a great record and again – you can find it on Youtube, probably.

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Software – Digital-Dance LP [1988]

Posted on February 22, 2018 by Very Warm

Youtube has picked up a reputation of unearthing all of these forgotten gems of weird, synth, jazz and pop music that otherwise would have been lost to time. We can see this with Japanese musicians like Midori Takada or Ryo Fukui, which just pops up in certain recommended videos sidebars thanks to Youtube’s mysterious algorithm.

This is a record that it brought me one day and I thought I’d share it here as well. Software is Peter Mergener and Michael Weisser and the record sounds like new age, synth noodling, beneath the waves, in the clouds, one with the soil, floating in the air earthy delight ambient. It’s really all over the place and super engaging to listen to. I can’t recommend it enough. Next time you find yourself in a Youtube hole, try and find something you’ve never seen before. Chances are it’ll be really damn cool.

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Black Moth Super Rainbow – “Mr No One” [2018]

Posted on February 21, 2018 by Very Warm

Black Moth Super Rainbow has a new record, Panic Blooms, coming out in May 4 via their own label Rad Cult. This will be their first proper LP since 2012’s Cobra Juicy, and follows a few b-sides compilations from both BMSR and solo records from band brain master Tobacco.

I’m really excited for this record – no one makes melty grilled cheese psych pop like these folks do, so anything new from them is greatly appreciated. Pre-order the record HERE.

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Djeli Moussa Diawara – “Haidara” [1983]

Posted on February 20, 2018 by Very Warm

Last year I had the pleasure of promoting a record called Ladilikan, from Malian group Trio Da Kali and Kronos Quartet. It was an incredible mix of strings and traditional African instruments like balafon and kora. This record put me on a hunt for West African music and has led me to this beauty, Yasimika, by Djeli Moussa Diawara (of Guinea). It’s widely regarded as one of the great masterpieces of West African music.

The balafon, guitar and kora playing is fleet of foot, whereas the vocals are wide and take up a lot of space – filling up all the little cracks left in the instrumentation. It’s all very beautiful and smooth, despite so many small parts going on at once.

If you’re looking to get into the vibrant, colorful world of African music, this would be a fantastic place to start.

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Ghazal – “Eternity” [2003]

Posted on February 19, 2018 by Very Warm

Wanted to feature more non-western music this month, so here’s the final piece from The Rain, a euphoric, improvised live album featuring kamancheh (Iranian bowed string instrument) player Kayhan Kalhor, sitar player Shujaat Husain Khan and tabla player Sandeep Das, all masters of their art. This is a truly special collaboration.

I can’t quite remember how this record came into my hands, but I’m thankful for whoever recommended it to me. It’s refreshing to hear musicians with such skill working in tandem with one another, especially when the results are this brilliant. The performers know how to tell a story and weave their narratives in amongst the other voices beautifully. There are some great call and response sections in this track, which is one of the reasons I wanted to focus on this one.

Forget all this chill electronic playlist nonsense: this is the perfect type of music to get lost in. To submit yourself to. To bow out of life for a fleeting moment and enter the world that these skilled storytellers have created, all on the fly.

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