GLOBAL A GO-GO: 2011

December 30, 2011

Program December 30, 2011: The Best of the Rest in 2011

This week I'll play 21 songs from this year that, for one reason or another, didn't make it onto my first two "Best of 2011" programs but I think merit another spin.

Program December 23, 2011: Top Ten Reissues of 2011

This week, it's part two of Global A Go-Go's look at the best recordings of 2011. This time, the focus is on reissues and compilations. Click "Read More" to see my top ten list, plus an additional ten runners-up.

Program December 16, 2011: Top Ten New Releases of 2011

Dude! It's time for my favorite program of the year -- the one where I reveal my top ten new releases of 2011, Global A Go-Go stylee, plus ten (or so) runners-up. Click "Read More" to see the winners.

Charts December 11, 2011

The Bachata Legends | The Bachata Legends

ARTIST: The Bachata Legends

TITLE: The Bachata Legends

LABEL: iASO

REVIEW: Bachata is a guitar-based style from the Dominican Republic, related to bolero, merengue and son, that has long been popular at home – it’s the country music of the DR.

ARTIST: various artists

TITLE: The Original Sound Of Cumbia: The History Of Colombian Cumbia & Porro As Told By The Phonograph, 1948-1979

LABEL: Soundway

REVIEW: DJ/musician/producer Will Holland, aka “Quantic,” is a cumbia fanatic. With cumbia in a worldwide renaissance, he’s not the only one. But he’s such a fanatic that he moved from to Colombia five years ago to be closer to the motherlode.

Program December 9, 2011

Will Holland (aka Quantic, pictured above) is a British DJ, musician and producer who moved to Colombia five years ago so he could be closer to the source material that was inspiring him -- cumbia. Will's remarkable compilation The Original History Of Cumbia has just been released, and you'll hear two tracks from it on this week's program.

Charts December 4, 2011

Black Truth Rhythm Band | Ifetayo

ARTIST: Black Truth Rhythm Band

TITLE: Ifetayo

LABEL: Soundway

REVIEW: The ongoing project to reissue every international funk record ever recorded continues apace. Soundway, which have been doing a bang-up job in Caribbean crate-digging over the last few years, has unearthed a gem here.

ARTIST: Dawda Jobarteh

TITLE: Northern Light Gambian Night

LABEL: Sterns

REVIEW: Dawda Jobarteh, a native of The Gambia in West Africa, is the scion of a long line of kora players.

ARTIST: Vijana Jazz Band

TITLE: The Koka Koka Sex Battalion

LABEL: Sterns

REVIEW: This is the fourth installment in East Africa specialist Doug Paterson’s troll of the archives of Nairobi’s AIT Records, and it might be my favorite so far.

Program December 2, 2011

As the year winds down, I'm digging in to a big plateful of reissues -- you'll hear some of the fruits of my listening on this week's program.

Charts November 27, 2011

ARTIST: Idrissa Diop & Cheikh Tidiane Tall

TITLE: Diamonoye Tiopite

LABEL: Teranga Beat

REVIEW: This is the first release for Teranga Beat Records, a new label focusing on the golden era (late 60s to mid 80s) in Senegal and other nearby West African countries, and it’s a gem.

ARTIST: Guelewar

TITLE: Halleli N’Dakarou

LABEL: Teranga Beat
REVIEW: Release number two from Teranga Beat Records is a 1982 live set that is the final recording of the Guelewar Band of Banjul, Gambia.

Charts November 20, 2011

Zdob Si Zdub | Basta Mafia!

ARTIST: Zdob Si Zdub

TITLE: Basta Mafia!

LABEL: Asphalt Tango
REVIEW: Zdob Si Zdub is a rock band from Moldova that started out in 1994 playing Russian-language punk (their first recording is entitled Moldovan Hardcore).

Program November 18, 2011

Mercifully for you, I rarely play artists on Global A Go-Go who have appeared in the Eurovision Song Contest. But I'm making an exception this week for Balkan-punk band Zdob Si Zdub (pictured above in their Eurovision 2011 performance) from Moldova, whose new album Basta Mafia! will be released early next year.

Charts November 13, 2011

Program November 11, 2011

Lots of new music from all over the planet on Global A Go-Go this week. We'll get started with my favorite recent releases from France -- some artists you might be familiar with (Camille, for example) and others you probably won't know (Control Tower, anyone?).

Charts November 6, 2011

The Lijadu Sisters | Danger

ARTIST: The Lijadu Sisters

TITLE: Danger

LABEL: Knitting Factory

REVIEW: The Lijadu Sisters, Taiwo and Kehinde, are identical twins who had a fairly successful career in Nigeria as a duo and as session singers.

ARTIST: Sibiri Samake

TITLE: Dambe Foli (Traditional Music)

LABEL: Kanaga System Krush

REVIEW: Malian donso (hunters) music is cited by many musicologists as one of the sources of modern-day American blues. And it’s at the root of one of Mali’s most popular musical exports, the “Wassoulou sound” of female singers like Oumou Sangare and Nahawa Doumbia.

I'll be joined by a guest in the studio this week -- Chris Dalbom (aka DJ CJ) founded WRIR's punk-rock program "Gabba Gabba Hey" back in 2005, when WRIR first went on the air. He's now Global A Go-Go's New Orleans correspondent, and he's here to fill us in on what's up, globally speaking, in the Crescent City.

Charts October 30, 2011

Kiran Ahluwalia | Aam Zameen : Common Ground

ARTIST: Kiran Ahluwalia

TITLE: Aam Zameen : Common Ground

LABEL: Avokado Artists
REVIEW: Kiran Ahluwalia is an Indian-Canadian singer-songwriter now based in New York City; she’s known both for her interpretations of traditional Indo-Pakistani forms (especially the love poems called ghazals) and for her wide-ranging cross-cultural collaborations.

Program October 28, 2011

Public Radio International's The World program recently broadcast an extremely insightful segment about Richmond's own Bio Ritmo. For a little bit of local color, they interviewed me and used about 10 seconds of that interview in the segment. You can hear the whole segment here:

http://media.blubrry.com/world/p/www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/media.theworld.org/audio/10192011.mp3

http://www.theworld.org/2011/10/indie-salsa-band-bio-ritmo/

Charts October 23, 2011

Program October 21, 2011

Benin's El Rego (pictured above, greeting Mariam Makeba at Cotonou Airport), is one of the great pioneers of contemporary West African music. At long last he's the subject of his own reissue collection, researched by Frank Gossner and released by Daptone Records

Charts October 16, 2011

Program October 14, 2011

The Richmond Folk Festival, one of the really great events of the year here, is this weekend. If you haven't yet prepared your Folk Festival calendar, or if you want to know about what you'll be missing, I'll be playing music from five of the artists I'm looking forward to seeing and hearing at this year's Festival.

ARTIST: various artists

TITLE: Electric Cowbell Fall 2011 45RPM Releases

LABEL: Electric Cowbell
REVIEW: Ex-Richmonder Jim Thomson’s Electric Cowbell Records released a set of seven new 45s on October 11.

ARTIST: Frente Cumbiero

TITLE: Meets Mad Professor

LABEL: Vampisoul

REVIEW: Not too long ago, cumbia was regarded as a quaintly archaic Latin American popular music form, its distinctive clip-clop rhythm calling to mind a trotting horse (or worse yet, a burro).

ARTIST: El Rego

TITLE: El Rego

LABEL: Daptone

REVIEW: Theophile Do Rego, better known as El Rego, was introduced to first-world audiences in Analog Africa’s African Scream Contest and Legends Of Benin compilations.

Charts October 9, 2011

Program October 7, 2011

Senor Flavio (pictured above), founder of the seminal Argentine rock en espanol band Los Fabulosos Cadillacs, is out-surfing and out-rocking kids half his age. Don't take my word for it -- tune in this week and you'll hear a track from his stellar new album, Nueva Ola.

Charts October 2, 2011

Program September 30, 2011

Let me start with a big Global A Go-Go thank you to the over 500 donors who contributed more than $38,000 during WRIR's Summer 2011 Fund Drive. Both those numbers are new records for us -- in fact, both are 20 percent higher than we've ever achieved before. We're blown away by your support and generosity.

Kal | Do You Know Who I Am?

ARTIST: Kal
TITLE: “Do You Know Who I Am?”
LABEL: Asphalt Tango

REVIEW: Kal (“black” in the Romani language) is one of the most exciting bands in the former Yugoslavia.

Charts September 25, 2011

Program September 23, 2011

I want to thank everyone who has donated so generously thus far in WRIR's Summer 2011 Fund Drive, which continues through Sunday. As I write this note on Thursday night, we've already raised $22,000, which is more than we've ever made in the first seven days of a fund drive.

The Cambodian Space Project | 2011: A Space Odyssey

ARTIST: The Cambodian Space Project

TITLE: 2011: A Space Odyssey

LABEL: Metal Postcard

REVIEW: Straight outta Phnom Penh, the Cambodian Space Project play 1960’s-style Cambodian rock with a 21^st century twist.

ARTIST: Los Destellos

TITLE: Constelacion

LABEL: Secret Stash

REVIEW: Los Destellos are probably the best-known purveyors of chicha, the psychedelic cumbia that is Peru’s great contribution to 60’s and 70’s music.

ARTIST: Joni Haastrup

TITLE: Wake Up Your Mind

LABEL: Tummy Touch / Soundway

REVIEW: Joni Haastrup was Nigeria’s soul brother number one in the 60’s and 70’s, a major superstar in the optimistic early years of independence.

ARTIST: various artists

TITLE: El Sonido De Tupac Amaru

LABEL: Masstropicas

REVIEW: Barbes Records’ two The Roots Of Chicha compilations and Vampisoul’s Cumbia Beat set have introduced thousands of listeners to the pleasures of Peruvian psychedelic cumbia.

Charts September 18, 2011

DJ Greybeard (right) is out of town this weekend at a fabulous event for which he bought his tickets long before the fund drive's dates were changed:

http://www.ponderosastomp.com/ponderosa_stomp_10_concert.php

Program September 16, 2011

This week, Global A Go-Go has the honor of kicking off WRIR's Summer 2011 Fund Drive -- the drive starts on Friday September 16 at 5 PM and wraps up on Sunday September 25 at 3 PM. And I'll be joined this week by the University of Richmond's Gamelan Raga Kusuma, who will play Balinese beleganjur and gender wayang music live in our studios.

Charts September 11, 2011

ARTIST: various artists

TITLE: Bambara Mystic Soul: The Raw Sound Of Burkina Faso 1974-1979

LABEL: Analog Africa
REVIEW: Burkina Faso is a land-locked country that was part of French West Africa in the colonial era and achieved independence (as Haute Volta) in 1960.

ARTIST: Grupo 2000

TITLE: El Destape

LABEL: Masstropicas
REVIEW: Chicha, the psychedelic Peruvian cumbia sound of the 60’s and 70’s, is in the midst of a remarkable global revival.

December 30, 2011

December 22, 2011

December 15, 2011

December 12, 2011

December 9, 2011

December 8, 2011

December 4, 2011

December 2, 2011

December 1, 2011

November 27, 2011

November 20, 2011

November 18, 2011

November 17, 2011

November 13, 2011

November 10, 2011

November 6, 2011

November 3, 2011

October 30, 2011

October 28, 2011

October 27, 2011

October 23, 2011

October 19, 2011

October 16, 2011

October 13, 2011

October 9, 2011

October 6, 2011

October 2, 2011

September 29, 2011

September 25, 2011

September 22, 2011

September 21, 2011

September 18, 2011

September 15, 2011

September 11, 2011

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