Hot Tips

[Jamie Renton]

Glad you're enjoying the Batida album Chris. I've tried it with a cup of tea & it works surprisingly well.

Sorry not to have responded sooner (only just noticed your posting)

[kk]

album stream and track-by track-by track introduction of the Batida album here

http://thequietus.com/articles/08315-li ... a-soundway

enjoying it very much, thanks Jamie

[Jamie Renton]

South African singer/guitarist Vusi Mahlasela has got a new album produced by Taj MahalSay Africa is its name. I'll say no more, as I'm reviewing it for the next issue of fRoots. But here's a live version of the title track to give you a taste:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ay7XCwI5unk

I'm also reviewing Greekadelia from Kristi Stassinopoulou, here she is at the fRoots 30th gig a couple of years ago:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=--2DIyfp6fg
I'll be interested to find out what the East Med lovin' hipsters over on the Greek and Turkish Music thread make of this album.

Jeb Loy Nichols album Special is hardly a hot tip, given that Norman and Gary played a track from it on their No Reason podcast back in January, but it has only just been made widely available and I've only just got my hands on a copy. Here's a taster: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=52Dfd0sgqHs

Try some Malian Afrobeat from Ben Zabo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k4yxgvvIBQI
Taken from his forthcoming debut album. Hopefully more on him in fRoots soon too.

I don't usually take to tribute albums, but find The Dualers Prince Buster Shakedown hard to resist
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WI4RIQi2kKA

[Chris P]

Try some Malian Afrobeat from Ben Zabo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k4yxgvvIBQI
Taken from his forthcoming debut album. Hopefully more on him in fRoots soon too

Cerys played something from this on R6 this morning - it certainly cheered up the 3 hour's Sunday work I did - along with some other excellent music she played

Greekadelia from Kristi Stassinopoulou.. interested to find out what the East Med lovin' hipsters over on the Greek and Turkish Music thread make of this album.

What I've heard so far sounds good, will listen more

[Jamie Renton]

London's Calling is a collection of covers of songs about our capital city from London based artists, including 2 versions of the title track (Transglobal Underground and Arun Ghosh), AJ Holmes & the Hackney Empire's Afrobeat version of Billy Bragg's A13, a lovely reggae take on Streets of London from Soothsayers, Ethiopia's Krar Collective doing Lilly Allen's LDN, Los Desterrados' Sephardic folk reading of I Don't Want to Go to Chelsea. There's also a Latin-y version of Itchycoo Park, Lord Kitchener's calypso London is the Place for Me done in a Gypsy swing style...

It might sound like a gimmick (and an Olympics cash-in) but it works surprisingly well for the most part. Out in July.

[AndyM]

Bet it hasn't got Noel Coward doing 'London Pride'.

[Rob Hall]

I'll bet it hasn't got "The 'Ouses In Between" either:

http://www.victorianweb.org/mt/musichall/2.html

IF IT WASN'T FOR THE 'OUSES IN BETWEEN
(Edgar Bateman / George LeBrunn)

Gus Elen - 1899


If you saw my little backyard
"Wot a pretty spot", you'd cry
It's a picture on a sunny summer day
Wiv the turnip tops and cabbages
Wot people doesn't buy
I makes it on a Sunday look all gay

The neighbours finks I grow 'em,
And you'd fancy you're in Kent
Or at Epsom if you gaze into the mews
It's a wonder as the landlord
Doesn't want to raise the rent
Because we have such nobby distant views

Oh! it really is a wery pretty garden
And Chingford to the Eastward could be seen
Wiv a ladder and some glasses
You could see to 'Ackney Marshes
If it wasn't for the 'ouses in between

We're as countrified as can be
Wiv a clothes prop for a tree
The tub-stool makes a rustic little stile
Ev'ry time the blooming clock strikes
There's a cuckoo sings to me
And I've painted up "To Leather Lane A Mile"

Wiv tomatoes and wiv radishes
Wot 'adn't any sale
The backyard looks a purfick mass o' bloom
And I've made a little beehive
Wiv some beetles in a pail
And a pitchfork wiv the 'andle of a broom

Oh! it really is a wery pretty garden
And Rye 'Ouse from the cock-loft could be seen
Where the chickweed man undresses
To bathe 'mong the water cresses
If it wasn't for the 'ouses in between

There's the bunny shares his egg box
Wiv the cross-eyed cock and hen
Though they 'as got the pip and him the 'morf
In a dog's 'ouse on the line-post
There was pigeons, nine or ten
Till someone took a brick and knocked it off

The dust cart though it seldom comes
Is just like 'Arvest 'Ome
And we made to rig a dairy up some'ow
Put the donkey in the wash'ouse
Wiv some imitation 'orns,
For we're teaching im to moo just like a kah

Oh! it really is a wery pretty garden
And 'Endon to the westward could be seen
And by clinging to the chimbley
You could see across to Wembley
If it wasn't for the 'ouses in between

Though the gasworks is at Woolwich
They improve the rural scene
For mountains they would very nicely pass
There's the mushrooms in the dust-hole
With the cowumbers so green
It only wants a bit 'o 'ot 'ouse glass

I wears this milkman's nightshirt
And I sits outside all day
Like the ploughboy cove what's mizzled o'er the Lea
And when I goes indoors at night
They dunno what I say
'Cause my language gets as yokel as can be

Oh! it really is a wery pretty garden
And soapworks from the 'ousetops could be seen
If I got a rope and pulley
I'd enjoy the breeze more fully
If it wasn't for the 'ouses in between

[Jamie Renton]

It hasn't got either of those, I'll grant you. But it has got a version of "I Live in Trafalgar Square" which must give it a bit of Olde Fogey Cred

[AndyM]

Old Fogey? Guilty as charged.

Like most of us!

[Rob Hall]

Roberto Fonseca - "YO" (Jazz Village) . Out nowish, and touring. The album he threatened to make last time round, and now has. A very strong release, off to all sorts of new places

Just got hold of this, and I can confirm that it is a very strong release. I've only played it just the once so far, but I know I'll be coming back to this.

[AndyP]

Mandingo Ambassadors - Tougna

Don't know if anyone has come across this Mamady Kouyate led band yet, album released today.
Ideal Guinean based music for the current heatwave in England, music with a sunny vibe. The link below provides streaming of the full album.

http://mandingoambassadorstougna.bandcamp.com/

[Jamie Renton]

The most fun my ears have had in ages, Phoenix City All-Stars present 2 Tone Gone Ska has the UK ska band playing 2 Tone tunes in a 1960s Jamaican style. Dave Barker sings on versions ofTears of a Clown and I Can't Stand Up for Falling Down, cheating a bit I suppose, as they're 60s soul tunes that were just covered on 2 Tone, but let's not get the toggles of our anoraks in a twist over it.

The rest are instrumentals, such as this rendering of the Specials' Stereotype as if performed by the Skatalites in about 1964
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3wo_FyRj6i0

Only eight tracks and it clocks in at under 40 minutes, but that just means (unlike most CDs) it doesn't outstay its welcome.

[Jamie Renton]

More ska with pun-loving Manchester 11-piece Baked A La Ska's new album Just Desserts complete with Britney and Steve Miller Band covers. One reviewer described them as "the Bellowhead of the UK ska scene", it was me, in a review I've just submitted to fRoots and if you'd like to find out more, please see the forthcomimg issue.

In the meantime, here they are, live n uplifting:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5t0zFjr2 ... re=related

[will vine]

Yes Jamie, the word Ska sure lends itself to puns. We were dancing (more undignified jumping up and down really) on the beach in Hastings last week to Ska'd For Life, and I notice a regular gig in Watford featuring Covered in Skas. I don't know about Bellowhead but your lot have a look of Wizzard about them.

[Jamie Renton]

I don't know about Bellowhead but your lot have a look of Wizzard about them.

You've got a point Will. See My Baby Ska could be there next single, I can already hear it in my head. They could follow it up with seasonal stomper I Wish It Could Be Ska-mas Everyday We are afterall dealing with a band renamed their Bowie coverSkaman.

Meanwhie...the reliably groovesome Analog Africa label have got a new double compilation out called Diablos del Ritmo - The Colombian Melting Pot 1960-1985 32 tracks of local styles mixed up with Afrobeat and funk, nearly all new to me and well worth investigating when it's released on 12th Nov. Here's a taster from Grupo Abharca
http://soundcloud.com/analog-africa/sch ... po-abharca