duggup

Extra Golden is a Kenyan-American band who stumbled into funk as an accidental by-product of its style, which combines  Nairobian benga music (Benga is one of the most beloved forms of popular music in Kenya)  and good old rock ’n’ roll. With a solid downbeat underpinning the drive the band make all the variations in […]

“HOT HORNS + HEAVY PERCUSSION“, thats what it says on the Nomo Myspace site. Oh yes, do they live up to it. Minimalist keyboard loops, fuzzed-out bass, the odd soulful vocal, and then there’s the electric mbira (a Zimbabwean thumb piano also known in parts of Southern Africa as a kalimba), an electric sawblade gamelan […]

Picture this - a choir of 30 men - complete with conductor - dressed in black suits who perform by shouting. My initial reaction was along the lines of “how bizarre.” Then I had another listen and before long had convinced myself that this unique barrage of sound had something elemental about it. Performed […]

Recently I ran across a video shot in Barcelona in 2004 by Kedar Misani of the Shumei Taiko Ensemble. It consists of a string of bites from an outdoor performance.

Taiko is a growing in popularity in America and there are numerous groups of drummers in Japan - several of which play professionally all around the […]

Cantara are from Edinburgh Scotland and they play a deliciously spicy fusion of Celtic inspired world music. They were formed about 8 years ago and while the lineup has changed their style of music has remained. The highland piper Louise Marshall Millington has the following to say about her band on her website VIPpiper:
Our line-up […]

Atmospheric musical arrangements in a style most classical and stylish; that’s how Ulytau initially struck me. There is more here than first meets the eye. They are a wonderfully eclectic mix of metal, classical meets traditional tunes.
Yep, they are a little flamboyant but they are not without substance. This trio from Kazakhstan in Central […]

Beirut were on the ABC Arts show last Sunday, they an instrumental piece and I thought they were amazing, a mariachi band playing Turkish folk tunes (there was a lot of brass in the mix), I then strolled over to www.myspace.com/beruit and was delighted to find that as well as a ten piece band they […]