etnobofin

A battalion of New Zealand musicians are invading Birmingham over the next few weeks. None of this was apparently planned, but it’ll effectively double the kiwi population of the city for a few nights anyway… here’s the (entirely coincidental) line-up:

The Black Seeds are on the road promoting their new album Solid Ground, and they’re playing the Hare & Hounds in Kings Heath tomorrow night (1st November). Unfortunately I’m out of town for the weekend…

Pianist and producer Mark de Clive-Lowe has been London-based for a while now but he’s soon to be setting up in LA. One of his last UK engagements is as musical director for 8sixteen32, a show put on at the Birmingham Rep by the Decypher Collective, a bunch of local grime MCs who come together to perform ‘grime theatre’… it sounds pretty unique.

A week later, Whakatane‘s most famous sons Kora are play Barfly in Digbeth on the 13th of November. Apparently they were awesome when they played Brum last year, so this is the gig I’m hoping to get along to.

And if all that weren’t enough, Fat Freddys Drop arrive in town the following night to play the Academy. I saw them in London back in April in front of a 95% kiwi crowd, they were awesome as usual. It was almost like being at the Grey Lynn Festival, except it was indoors, at night, and you could only get Carlsberg at the bar.

(The video above is a Fat Freddy’s performance in France on Canal+, at the start it’s funny to hear the crowd clapping on the 1 and 3 rather than the 2 and 4.)

One of the more fascinating features of the Guardian online over the past few months has been the regular contributions of photojournalist John D. McHugh. McHugh is spending 6 months with the US 173rd Airborne in Afghanistan (it’s his third “tour” in Afghanistan – what a way to make a living). McHugh’s work is insightful and moving, and I hope he gains some recognition for it.

Despite being embedded with an American military unit, McHugh’s photos and stories comes across as stark and factual, and are all the more engaging because they effectively communicate some of the grim reality of war for the Afghan people as well as the western soldiers stationed there.

McHugh makes a honest attempt to remain objective, whether he is documenting the days of boredom and minutes of terror for soldiers sitting in a mountain outpost, or the real communication challenges faced by local Afghan citizens and US soldiers.

McHugh’s approach to war journalism is an interesting contrast to the recent coverage by NBC, whose camera team was in-and-out of the country in one week, (they were heading onwards to Baghdad). and whose presence may have contributed to the friendly-fire death of a US soldier.

Photo by Violinsoldier

But perhaps some of the most insightful images of the Afghanistan conflict have been taken by soldiers themselves. Violinsoldier’s images on Flickr are a fascinating mix of beauty and mundanity: photos of his MRE meal-packs sit next to candid snaps of local people taken while on patrol.

Currently the internet provides ready access to a western view on this conflict. Hopefully in the long term (if you believe the debatable supposition that the situation in Afghanistan can be improved), more local voices and images will be seen and heard around the world.

It’s a busy week. Given limited time to write anything original myself, here’s a round-up of some highlights from some other blogs sliding down the RSS feeds.

Aren’t the Canadians lovely people? Jean-François at Jazz Frisson in Montréal has posted some classic Hollywood jazz moments: Lionel Hampton/Benny Goodman/Tommy Dorsey/Louis Armstrong etc in 1948 and the Bing Crosby vs Louis Armstrong MC Battle from High Societyin 1956.

Sarah Laurence isn’t Canadian. But she’s from Maine, which is pretty close.  Last weekend she went hiking in the White Mountains... the autumn colours in Maine are in a different class to the brown sludge currently filling gutters here in Edgbaston.

Andrew Dubber has written in support of a Kids’ Radio Station for New Zealand.  Remembering how important radio was to me when I was young, this is a good idea long overdue.

Klari in Paris saw the Kings Singers in concert on Monday night. Ch’uis jaaaaalouuuux moi. Here’s a clip of them singing Ellington’s Creole Love Call:

Once upon a time (like ten years ago) I thought that all worldly material aspirations could be satisfied by possessing the Miles Davis Complete Live at the Plugged Nickel box set. I ended up getting Coltrane’s Village Vanguard 1961 set instead, because it was cheaper.

But now, older and wiser, I think I want something different. I saw one in a shop in Germany last year, and fell in love:

And here’s a stop-motion video of how to put the thing together:

Raul Barboza – Nostalgia de Negro Juan
From Raul Barboza [Buy]

Raul Barboza‘s music often makes me cry. His phrasing is all tension and release, you could almost say he swings. Musical themes evolve out of jungle rumblings into soaring melodic lines before diving back below the surface. In his hands, an accordeon sounds like a mischievous spirit struggling to break free.

Barboza grew up surrounded by the folk music in northern Argentina – a region where indigenous Guaraní culture has interplayed in fascinating way with immigrant traditions of Hispanic and Volga German origin.

A really good introduction to Raul Barboza’s music is the album La Tierra Sin Mal, which won a Diapason d’Or prize in France in 1994.

Barboza has spent much of his professional career living in France – he talks about his homecoming tour to Argentina in 2001 in this interview (in French, sorry no subtitles):

This is just too much. James Brown giving a dance lesson!

With the approaching US presidential election, the BBC are running a bunch of documentaries about American history and politics.

The first episode of historian Simon Schama‘s The American Future seems promising. Schama’s series is essentially a history of American optimism – an unusually abstract topic for an “anglo-saxon” documentary. Episode One explores the cherished belief in the unending bounty of the American continent, and how it has come to grief in the Colorado river basin. The whole series was filmed during the presidential primaries earlier this year:

Last week BBC4 also screened Stefan Forbes’ Boogie Man: The Lee Atwater Story, which tells the story of the Republican Party’s most mercurial and cynical political strategist. With his “dirty tricks” campaign in the 1988 Bush-Dukakis election, Atwater fundamentally shifted Republican Party tactics, providing the mold for Karl Rove and George W. Bush’s twin “victories” in 2000 and 2004:

Boogie Man is both sad and scary at the same time – particularly the description of Atwater’s deathbed repentance as he lay dying of a brain tumour in 1991. It recalled to my mind the excellent Fog of War from 2005, in which an 85 year-old Robert McNamara reflects on his life in war and politics, from World War Two to Vietnam:

And if all this politics is getting too much, then there’s always Don’t be Denied to look forward to – a documentary on Neil Young which is being screened at the end of October

Menn Ársins – Þögnin heyrir allt
From Menn Ársins (Self-Titled) Free mp3 download [Buy album]

There’s a lot of bad news coming out of Iceland at the moment. So, in an attempt to warm the suddenly frosty relations between the UK and Icelandic governments, here’s some good news: Menn Ársins have just released their first album.

Menn Ársins (“Men of the Year” in Icelandic) were formed 3 years ago, and since then have developed nice line in artful pop – some songs sung in English, most of them in Icelandic. The group reached the Icelandic semifinals of Eurovision with their song If You Were Here (watch the video on YouTube).

Recorded at Lundgaard Studios in Denmark, this debut disc puts emphasisis on good pop tunes, with arrangements embellished by extra instruments such as the trumpet on Þögnin heyrir allt and the string section on Póstkort. Although the band initially was formed around the songs of singer/guitarist Sváfnir Sigurðarson, all four musicians contribute to the writing – for instance 12 Steps to the Liquor Store was built from some jazz material that bassist Sigurdór Guðmundsson had been working on for other projects.

I particularly love the subtle piano line that underpins Augun Opnast (apparently this means “Open Your Eyes” in English), and the video is equally understated:

I’m not totally neutral in posting about this album – Sigurdór has been one of the longest-lasting online correspondents on this blog, and not only is he a fantastic bass player and all-round Jaco Pastorius expert, he’s also a rather talented amateur photographer, and took the photo used on the cover of the album.  His Flickr site is worth a visit for some evocative images of Icelandic landscape and people.

Several mp3s are available free from the Menn Ársins page on Last.fm, and you can hear more on theirspace. And you can help rebuild Iceland’s foreign currency reserves by buying the album online.

The Sea and Cake – Car Alarm
From Car Alarm: Thrill Jockey Records [Buy]

The Sea and Cake‘s new album Car Alarm has recently arrived in the inbox, and it’s a cracker ! I’m not too familiar with this Chicago band’s previous work, but this material is really strong – recalling the best bits of mid-90s indie rock (Pavement, Sonic Youth’s pop side) mixed with a little bit of Tortoise-like experimentalism. The strong melodies sometimes echo that other Windy City band, Smashing Pumpkins. (But in a good, lacking-Billy-Corgan’s-whiny-voice sort of way).

It’s semi-intellectual stuff: vocalist/guitarist Sam Prekop has a PhD in music according to Wikipedia. And the band’s drummer is none other than the rather precocious John McEntire of Tortoise, dropping jazzy breakbeats into songs like Fuller Moon like it’s the most natural thing in the world. But the album never sounds like it’s shoe-gazing: all the tracks have strong pop hooks and super tunes. Yum yum yum.

Current favourite track is definitely Weekend – acoustic guitars dissolving into electro-breakbeat bliss. An example of how perfection is best wrought from simplicity and brevity. Here’s the video:

The Sea and Cake on myspace

“It’s a very weird time – it’s like the Cold War in reverse: America is now nationalising wealth and invading Afghanistan, and the Russians are oil-rich capitalists.”

Jo Caulfield – BBC Radio 4 News Quiz, Friday 3rd October 2008