San Jose, California’s Xiu Xiu were quite a heavy presence in the Los Angeles underground music scene during the early 2000s, and it seems that they’ve maintained their quality, as well as their bleak lyrical content.
[Music] Geronimo Arafat – To Writhe Amongst The Lepers
Geronimo Arafat are an experimental music project based in Los Angeles which has been in operation since around 2011. For those of you who remember the experimental music cassette culture of the 1980s and early 1990s, and love bands like The Residents, Sun City Girls, Merzbow or even early Nurse With Wound, this project is VERY much worth exploring.
[Music] Olivier Messiaen – Fête des belles eaux (1937)
Olivier Messiaen was the giant of French contemporary classical music during the 20th Century, and drew his inspiration from things as disparate as Japanese ethnic music and his devotion to Roman Catholicism.
[Music] Namgar – Nomad
Namgar is a Buyrat artist who hails from the Russian province of Siberia. Her music is a fusion of traditional Buryat and Mongol elements, as well as rock and world music.
[Music] Luke Haines – Inside The Restless Mind Of Rollerball Rocco
Luke Haines is famous for fronting such bands as The Auteurs, Baader Meinhof and Black Box Recorder, but this solo LP, 9 1/2 Psychedelic Meditations on British Wrestling of the 1970s & Early ’80s, takes the cake, especially as the aforementioned Mark “Rollerball” Rocco was a British pro wrestling hero of mine.
[Music] Letha Rodman Melchior – Edymion/MWCIE
There’s little worse, from a musical standpoint, than discovering an artist whose work gleams brightly after she has left this mortal coil, and from cancer, that cruel killer. Letha Rodman Melchior was a painter of some renown as well as a composer of fine experimental music. She hailed from Durham, North Carolina, and recorded for Siltbreeze Records, with whom she released two absolutely stunning albums: Handbook For Mortals from 2013, and Shimmering Ghosts, released posthumously in 2015.
[Music] Santana feat. Mory Kanté – Yeke Yeke
The legendary Carlos Santana hooked up with Guinean kora player and vocalist Mory Kanté for this collaboration at the Montreux Jazz Festival on July 9th 2006.
[Music] David Bowie – Valentine’s Day
I couldn’t resist.
[Music] Aaron Dilloway & Jason Lescalleet – Black Mountain
Aaron Dilloway & Jason Lescalleet recording a gorgeous ambient album in 2014 called Popeth, which is sadly unavailable, even as a download, now.
[Music] The Jay Vons – Want You Tomorrow
From Daptone Records, the same company who brought you Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings, comes another neo-soul combo, The Jay Vons. The feature members of Reigning Sound, Naomi Shelton & the Gospel Queens, and Robbers on High Street.
A Miscellany Of Tasteful Music 