Name: The Rough Guide to Global Dance: World Beat Carnival - All Areas
Brand: World Music Library (Japan)
SKU: 533433
Price: 114 HKD
Availability: InStock

Performer Notes

This is a continuous in-the-mix CD compiled and mixed DJ Pete Lawrence.
Producer: Phil Stanton.
Compilation producer: Pete Lawrence.
Includes liner notes by Pete Lawrence.
Liner Note Author: Pete Lawrence.
Photographers: Lucy Willis; Adrian Boot.
Of all the projects undertaken by the Rough Guide's music team, this one had to be the most intimidating. How does one accurately give a picture of the innovations in global music culture -- especially with a transcultural bent, on a single CD with 12 tracks? Peter Lawrence had the unenviable job of coming up with just such an offering. The only thing that made the gig a plus is that he was accenting "global dance" as in dance culture, so hybrids of all kinds were allowable. He wasted no time; the first track by Tunisian/French DJ duo Smadj is a frenetic trip through techno, drum'n'bass, and folk musics from the Middle East, where ouds, keyboards, ambient textures, djembe drums, and drum loops careen into one another shifting and changing as they do -- the track is all energy and force. From here the CD moves to Jazzanova, a German ensemble that practices a mixology of current electro techniques and injects them into the current wave of Brazilian jazz fusion. Given how club-oriented both these selections are, it would seem easy to get a bead on where Lawrence is going with his global dance theme. But not so fast. There are no breakbeats on former Fela Kuti drummer Tony Allen's Nigerian Afro-funk. As slippery and dark as his late employers, it also goes deeper and reaches wider. Allen is not content to reference James Brown, Funkadelic, and American jazzers. This track, "Get Together," is from his classic album Nepa from 1982. Here organs and electric pianos click through the drums' polyrhythmic pace and create a trance-like rhythm for dancers and singers to chant along with the lyric. Dub techniques float through the mix as sounds enter and exit without explanation. And we've only heard three tunes. The mix gets further skewed in a rewarding direction when Frederic Galliano presents the African Divas for a more traditional look at global dance, utilizing less electricity and more vocal innovation to get the same job done. But the set goes veering off into so many directions it's difficult to keep track from here. There's Tosca's "Boss on the Boat" (one half of the Kruder & Dorfmeister team), showing an easy and sleazy operatic take on work songs and dance culture, but there is also Brazilian Marcos Valle's gorgeous "Bahia Blue," with its wailing soprano saxophone and drum intro. When the drum machines kick in, house rhythm style, the saxophone with its trills and twitters ushers in a kind of electric funk that Miles, were it not so rooted in the moment, might have stolen himself. Certainly the tune has been influenced by the jams on Davis' On the Corner album, but it's breezier, like War's "City, Country, City" as well. The jam is in the statement of rhythm over melodic intent, and it's a groove that just gets deeper with every pass through the chorus. The disc ends with an acoustic mix of Jepht‚ Guillaume's "The Prayer," an eight-minute ride through a rainstorm with a minor key theme stated repeatedly as an acoustic guitar solos through the storm. Congas, bongos, djembes, and an eventual drum loop enter, carrying the message of the tune into the heart of every listener; the rhythms are so infectious, it's not the feet but the torso that moves first because within it is contained the heat. No matter how hard it thunders, the warmth is held by the guitarist's insistence on this simple melody and, just before the end, strings and a flute support him too, carrying him into the eye of the hurricane as the drums play themselves into exhaustion to provide him a way back. It's a breathtaking way to end an album that claims to be representative of global dance music: "The Prayer" is music pushing itself through the thunder's rhythmic assault and therefore joins it as a part of the dancing universe on both physical and metaphysical planes. What a ride. ~ Thom Jurek

Album: The Rough Guide to Global Dance: World Beat Carnival - All Areas
#	Song Title	Time
1)	Isotropie - Smadj
2)	Caravelle - Jazzanova
3)	Get Together - Tony Allen
4)	Kafo Fit‚ - Fr‚d‚ric Galliano & the African Divas
5)	Maine - Sidestepper
6)	Samba Do Gringo Paulista - Suba
7)	Fusionist, The - T.J. Rehmi
8)	Boss on the Boat - Tosca
9)	Butter 6/4 - Idiot Savant
10)	Gypsy Woman - Montefiori Cocktail
11)	Bahia Blue - Marcos Valle
12)	Prayer/Acrostic Mix, The - Jepht‚ Guillaume (Acoustic mix)

Album: The Rough Guide to Global Dance: World Beat Carnival - All Areas
#	Song Title	Time
1)	Isotropie - Smadj
2)	Caravelle - Jazzanova
3)	Get Together - Tony Allen
4)	Kafo Fit‚ - Fr‚d‚ric Galliano & the African Divas
5)	Maine - Sidestepper
6)	Samba Do Gringo Paulista - Suba
7)	Fusionist, The - T.J. Rehmi
8)	Boss on the Boat - Tosca
9)	Butter 6/4 - Idiot Savant
10)	Gypsy Woman - Montefiori Cocktail
11)	Bahia Blue - Marcos Valle
12)	Prayer/Acrostic Mix, The - Jepht‚ Guillaume (Acoustic mix)