alternative alternative music

[Basstrap]

no folks, we shant be discussing our indie rock fixations here.

let us explore other genres, shall we.

jazz
world music

I walked into a music store in vancouver last month and it was almost entirely devoted to bands like the Beuno Vista Social Club...It was awesome. you know, the kind of music you imagine people dancing barefoot to in some sweaty south america club.

I am aware of a a large group of people who think jazz is all bad. This makes me sad because it's so not very true.
I'll admit to be no big fan of harcore saxaphone ejaculation jazz...but there is some pretty smooth grooves out there which may be entirely responsible for today electronic scene

what about classical?
mariachi!!

I saw Calexico and Lhasa in concert recently.
Lhasa opened for them and it was beautiful almost beyond words.

anyway..yeah

 

[yertle-the-turtle]

I got this 3 cd boxset of traditional and contemporary folk music (mostly British) the other day. Really cool stuff. Richard Thompson, Steeleye Span, June Tabor, Martin Carthy, Oysterband and the like.

and there's this great Argentinian folk-rock song called 'Cancion para mi muerte' by a band called Sui Generis. very cool. I've got a couple of other songs by them on my PC at the moment but I think 'Cancion' is the best one.

I've also managed to finally enjoy a bit of jazz. I can't say I'm a huge fan yet or that I know a lot, and the melodies don't really stick with me, but when I do listen to it I find myself grooving to it alot. Like everytime I hear 'Goodbye Pork Pie Hat' by Charles Mingus I think I'm in some kind of 1940s American noir movie, which is pretty darn cool.

I have the first album by this guy called Caetano Veloso, who's from Brasil. I haven't heard any of his stuff afterward, which is supposed to be really out there musically and politically, but this one's just full of relaxing bossa nova grooves.

and as always I have French pop fixations but, well, nevermind.

 

[u2popmofo]

Dead Can Dance


Description of them I found on allmusic:

Dead Can Dance combines elements of European folk music ? particularly music from the Middle Ages and the Renaissance ? with ambient pop and worldbeat flourishes. Their songs are of lost beauty, regret and sorrow, inspiration and nobility, and of the everlasting human goal of attaining a meaningful existence.

 

[Salome]

I'm quite a big fan of fado artist Mariza
Bebel Gilberto makes some pretty great Bosso Nova inspired (or something) music

definitely check out the Network label for some great world music
I've got 2 of their compilations (Island Blues with various artists from from 'Africa, The Caribbean, Indonesia, The Pacific Rim and Europe' and Desert Blues 2 which features many great african artists)

Los Lobos made some great albums
I'd recommend Kiko to anyone
their earlier albums such as "How Will The Wolf Survived" are more mexicana oriented

I'd also like the name the aussie garage rock compilation "Do the Pop" which features bands such as Radio Birdman, The Saints, The Screaming Tribesmen, Hoodoo Gurus etc
great stuff

there's some great stuff out there

 

[u2popmofo]

Deep Forest (HeartlandGirl can tell you much more about them than I can)


Description from allmusic:

Innovatively fusing traditional ethnic musics with state-of-the-art rhythms, the work of Deep Forest was best typified by their 1993 smash "Sweet Lullaby," which brought together the contemporary sounds of ambient techno with the haunting voices of the Pygmies of the central African rain forest.

 

[U2DMfan]

Dead Can Dance is awesome.

I'm betting Afro-Celt SS doesn't count, but it might?

 

[Jack In The Box]

Dead Can Dance
Calexico
Mariachi music

If you like all that, should listen to Mexican rock bands as Cafe Tacuba or San Pascualito Rey, they (SPR) play something that they define like "dark guapachoso" or as I define it "when the Smiths meet Buena Vista Social Club"

There exists an Argentinian band called Babas?nicos that is a mixture between Los Temerarios (traditional mexican music band) and a bit of pop and another little of rock

And entering a more purist side, there is a group of 'danz?n' called La Sonora Santanera, I find them like a good alternative to the popular music


edit: I forgot to mention Lila Downs, she is from Mexico and sings songs of the Mayab, the Mayan zone of my country... together with her is Chavela Vargas, they, each one for their account have done a version of "La Llorona" my favorite traditional Mexican song


.

 

[yertle-the-turtle]

oh and though we might be entering a bit of cod-world music territory here, i thought the 1 giant leap project was excellent.

 

[The Sage]

There's a lot of great Japanese traditional music, and there's a good chance of me liking anything with pan pipe type sounds in (for example in this song called Tomorrow by some washed up Irish band ). I do actually find myself liking a lot of folk music from around the world, theres a lot of emotion and atmosphere in some of it.

 

[Kieran McConville]

Let me tell you how I feel about jazz: I love the idea of jazz. I am less enthused about how the primal idea of jazz (a thing every bit as wild and free as rock n' roll) has been transformed into a sort of 'cool' background to play in car ads or whatever.

But hell yeah, I like the idea of jazz. Miles Davis was great. Louis Armstrong was great. I'm showing how out of touch I am lol.

World music can be great but it's a terrible label to stick on a cd cause it carries so many associations. It covers everything from Nusrat fateh ali khan to Georges Zhampir and his magical pan pipes.

 

[dandy]

after years of loathing all forms of jazz, i slowly fell in love with it. during one particularly stressful exam period, i threw on a little ella fitzgerald to chill out with, and that started it. i'm a big fan of the ladies:

ella (she really is the best)
billie holliday
julie london
sarah vaughn
holly cole
diana krall
carol welsman

and i really love all the fun, funky jazz tunes like they play in the background on sex and the city. a man called adam, st germain, mr scruff, etc.


world music is also another fave of mine. dead can dance, buena vista social club... good stuff. i'm also a huge fan of:

natacha atlas man, can that woman sing
mano chao good road trip music
saeed iranian pop music at its best
nitin sawhney from india
wax poetic put out some good stuff

the buddha bar compilations are fantastic. good dinner party music, good late night sipping a glass of wine tunes.

cool thread!

 

[neutral]

dead can dance is fantastic.

I used to loathe jazz too but I had this great teacher in my History of Jazz class in college. He got me into some good stuff.

Could anyone recommend some classical stuff to check out? I really don't have much but umm I listen to Handel's Messiah year round. I could use some new stuff.

 

[Basstrap]

someitmes on nightshift I'll put on the classical music station
it does wonders
But I don't know what I'm listening to half the time

Rocmananov[sic] is pretty great

 

[ti-hua]

Dead Can Dance is awesome.

I'm betting Afro-Celt SS doesn't count, but it might?

I absolutely love these two bands!!

Any other recommendations?

 

[OzAurora]

I am a huge lover of world music, here are my personal picks....

artist: dead can dance, songs: the host of seraphim, american dreaming, cantara
Inkuyo (andean pan pipe band) wipalla
sheva (israeli world music) they might be a bit hard to find, but anything from their debut cd is awesome
afro celt sound system- lovers of light
now here are my west African music picks....
Angelique Kidjo- adouma
Babba Maal- I will follow
Youssou N'Dour- Birima

others will come later, but try any of those out

I will also recommend that if you want to hear something quite different that you try Lonnie Anderson- she is a bit experimental, a bit weird and is now married to Lou Reed

 

[HeartlandGirl]

For classical music, I'd recommend Mozart. His Requiem is quite possibly my favorite piece of music ever. I also like Modest Mussorgsky, works including Night on Bald Mountain and Pictures at an Exhibition. Beethoven is great as well. I know those are some big names--guess I'm not very 'indie' when it comes to classical.

And back to Deep Forest, I love them and would recommend them. The music on all their albums is essentially the same style, but the specifics change. Indigenous vocals with electronic music. Where they're coming from geographically changes with each album:

Deep Forest - African music, especially from Cameroon, Burundi, Senegal, and of the Pygmies

Boheme - as listed in the liner notes, music of the Hungarians, Belarussians, Taiwanese, Mongolians, Balinese, Georgians, Russians, Magyars, American Indians, and Inuits

Comparsa - A lot of Latin and Caribbean influence on this one; voices from South Africa, Madagascar, Mexico, Belize, and Cuba. One song is a mix of Arab and Andalusian music.

Music Detected - This album is supposedly a tribute to the music that the members of Deep Forest listened to growing up. I think it's their only album with any English lyrics, although the flavor is still distinctly Deep Forest.

Those are the four albums I have. I've been amazed at the people I know who like Deep Forest. My dad, a truck driver who listens to country and oldies, loves them. I also had a friend in high school who had never listened to anything but country. Once, on a bus ride home from a basketball game, she asked to hear what I was listening to. The look on her face when she heard those Pygmy voices was priceless. She loved it. So yeah, that's my Deep Forest spiel. I think they're worth a listen.

 

[Muggsy]

There exists an Argentinian band called Babas?nicos that is a mixture between Los Temerarios (traditional mexican music band) and a bit of pop and another little of rock
.

i hate Babas?nicos... lol... i don't know why i can't stand them.

but i like
Sui Generis i love them
Cafeta Cuba
La maldita vecindad (i don't know if they fit here i give a fuck about music genres but i like them)
La mojiganga (ska music )

and i like stuff like the Buena vista social club and old hard Salsa music

 

[Fuzzy Bird]

La Maldita Vecindad Y Los Hijos Del Quinto Patio (complete name)... they're ska, I don't like them, but my father is fan

I prefer Tijuana No, but they're punk-ska

...

 

[Salome]

I second Natacha Atlas and Babba Maal