23449. (Ferde Grofé) Hud­son Riv­er Suite
23450. (How To Dress Well) Love Remains
23451. (Leon­i­nus [Leo Léonin]) Messe du Jour de Noël
23452. (Nathan Chan & ThatVi­o­laKid) “Hel­lo” [Adele cover]
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Mbong­wana Star

I fell in love with African pop music long ago, in Nige­ria, dur­ing the heady days of Vic­tor Owaifo, Dele Abio­dun and King Sun­ny Adé (whose hand I got to shake in Toron­to, many years lat­er). I’ve tried to fol­low it ever since, but there is sim­ply too much to keep track of. Africa pro­duces wave after wave of new music, the hotspots shift­ing back and forth from region to region. Kin­shasa is a hotspot, lately.

Mbong­wana Star is tak­ing African pop in a new direc­tion with the release this year of From Kin­shasa. Mbong­wana actu­al­ly means “change” in Lin­gala, and the change is appar­ent. Musi­cians in the Con­go* have long been in a groove whose out­side influ­ences were pri­mar­i­ly reg­gae, souk­ous and clas­sic rhyhm and blues. From Kin­shasa is quite dif­fer­ent. It has a spa­cy, almost psy­che­del­ic sen­si­bil­i­ty that pulls influ­ences from punk and elec­tron­i­ca, and has an ambi­ence some­thing like the sci­ence fic­tion-motown exper­i­ments that George Clin­ton made back in the 1970s. This amount of inno­va­tion is all the more remark­able because the founders of the band, Yakala “Coco” Ngam­bali and Nsi­tu­vui­di “Theo” Nzon­za, are men in their six­ties, con­fined to wheel­chairs, and vet­er­ans of the brief celebri­ty of Staff Ben­da Bilili. Read more »

23399. (Ferde Grofé) Avi­a­tion Suite
23400. (Gio­van­ni Pier­lui­gi da Palest­ri­na) Mis­sa Viri Galilaei
23401. (Gio­van­ni Pier­lui­gi da Palest­ri­na) Motet: Viri Galilaei
23402. (Gio­van­ni Pier­lui­gi da Palest­ri­na) Mag­ni­fi­cat Pri­mi Toni
23403. (Alpha Blondy & The Solar Sys­tem) “Yitzhak Rabin” [sin­gle]
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23351. (Zchiw Song Ensem­ble) Zchiw [Жъыу] [Zamudin Ghwch’e & Zawir Negh­wey on 
. . . . . ancient Adi­gean instruments]
23352. (Orb) Orb’s Adven­tures Beyond the Ultraworld
23353. (Edward Sharpe & the Mag­net­ic Zeros) Here
23354. (Glenn Miller) Sec­ond Press­ing [5 disk set]
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23340. (Giro­lamo Fres­cobal­di) Mes­sa Madona
23341. (Adam and the Ants) Dirk Wears White Sox
23342. (Gilles Bin­chois) Triste plaisir et douloureuse joie [instru­men­tal version]
23343. (Fuck But­tons) “Bright Tomor­row”; “Lit­tle Bloody Shoul­der” [sin­gle]
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23327. (Philopoc­tus de Caser­ta) En remi­rant vo douce pourtraiture
23328. (Hen­ri Dutilleux) Tim­bres, espaces, mou­ve­ment, ou ‘La nuit étoilée’ Part 1
23329. (Iron But­ter­fly) Heavy
23330. (Adam & the Ants) “Deutsch­er Girls” [from Derek Jarman’s Jubilee soundtrack]
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23304. Did­jeri­doo: Musique aborigène d’Australie
23305. (Off­spring) The Offspring
23306. (Kas­siani) Dox­a­zomen sou Christe
23307. (Kas­siani) Ek rizis agathis
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