Oh, I’m tired of looking for homeAnd asking about my loved onesMy soul is woundedSo the Syrian singer Omar Souleyman cries on “Mawal,” the penultimate track off his 2017 album, To Syria, With Love. After six years of war in his home country, the man known among Westerners for his dabke jams, for his laments to heartsickness, and for his ubiquitous keffiyeh and sunglasses can hold in his feelings no longer—he misses home.The war in Syria has spurred a global refugee crisis, stoked xenophobic and Islamophobic fears across Europe and America, and prompted U.S. president Donald Trump to add the Levantine nation to his list of countries thrown onto a controversial travel ban. But Syria’s musical traditions offer a much-needed escape from the horrors of war. Indeed, as this playlist shows, there is much to explore, from honey-voiced pop stars like George Wassouf and Assala Nasri to classical and folk traditions championed today by the likes of Ibrahim Keivo and the Orchestra or Syrian Musicians (members of whom performed a much-heralded concert last year in London with Damon Albarn and other guests as part of the musical collective Africa Express).Even before the war, Syria was never given a good rep in Western media representations; talk was all about Bashar al-Assad and the “axis of evil.” But in the Middle East, this country is famed for its rich traditions of art, music, and culture. Indeed, the capital Damascus contends as one of the oldest cities in the world, while the major city of Aleppo was famed as a center for sacral chants and the poetic and musical form called mowashah, preserved for centuries among Sufi and Christian musicians. Today, the situation may be incredibly dire for millions of Syrians, but there’s still the music, helping us heal from yesterday to today.
A wide-ranging combination of Latin folklore and Anglo alt-rock form the crux of Latin alternative music. As inventive players paved paths to niche subcultures that shifted further from mainstream pop, rock and Latin regionalism over the years, they also opened up an immense portal of global yet Latin-minded formations. Whether artists pulled from radio-friendly pop (e.g. Paulina Rubio, Mariah Carey) or their parents’ classic rock (e.g., Los Locos del Ritmo, Elvis), this bicultural/multicultural recipe inspired game-changers to create a like-minded identity, with plenty of attitude.From vintage-synth-loving Chileans like Javiera Mena, Gepe, or Alex Anwandter producing rosey-tinted indie-pop, to electro-folkloric producers in Argentina (Chancha Via Circuito), Colombia (Bomba Estéreo), Ecuador (Nicola Cruz), and Peru (Dengue Dengue Dengue) ushering in a new digital cumbia enigma, the ever-elastic art form is essentially without boundaries.So what does it mean for brown-eyed soul troubadours like Chicano Batman to grow up on low-rider funk and Motown-style oldies at an L.A. swap meet? Or Mexican charro-clad rockeros Mexrrissey finding kinship with melancholic Manchester pop icon Morrissey? Or even Cuban/Puerto Rican soulstress Xenia Rubinos displaying an affinity for ‘50s-era jazz chanteuses and open-mic MCs alike? From hip-hop to electronic to folk and urban, this Latin-rooted concoction continues to flourish and take unprecedented shapes throughout the Americas and Spain.By no means is this a comprehensive list of the scene’s countless configurations, but instead a starting point for newcomers to explore Latin alternative’s numerous stylistic configurations, and to familiarize themselves with the compelling works of Latinx artists of Latin America, the diaspora, and beyond. (Heads up: you won’t find any Shakiras, Romeo Santos, or J. Los here.)
When rock made its entry into Latin America many moons ago (notably around the time Elvis Presley debuted in the continent during the ‘50s), it spawned a bevy of “refried Elvises” or imitators replicating The King’s style but with Spanish lyrics. Most Latin American bands spent decades aping the rock aesthetic coming out of America and the U.K., until the ‘80s. An unprecedented approach to the style took shape and musicians began to finally embrace their roots, fusing anything from brass melodies to boleros to cumbias and sones—all against traditional rock instrumentation—thus acquiring their own musical identity. Groups like Argentinean dance-punk agitators Todos Tus Muertos, Spain’s New Wave provocateurs Radio Futura, and Mexican dark-wave cumbieros Caifanes are among the slew of innovators to unflinchingly mix regional styles with rock arrangements.
While the rock en español forefathers of the 1980s laid the groundwork for the south-of-the-border movement (Spain included), it took until the following decade for the scene to explode globally. Each project stood as its own original fusion: Mexico’s Maldita Vecindad, armed with a boisterous sax, adopted pachuco swagger; Chile’s Los Prisioneros made rebellious synth-punk; Argentina’s Los Fabulosos Cadillacs created rowdy murga-driven ska; and Spain/France’s Manu Chao spreaded lover’s-rock bohemianism. The foundations, however, were similar: Each rebellious outfit delivered their own socio-political agenda while commanding the dance floor, or mosh pit.
As the scene reconfigured approaching the new millennium, acts who showed insatiable lasting power (like Café Tacvba, Babasónicos, Zoé) branched out of the then-tiresome rock en español category, and joined the new cohort of Latin alternative iconoclasts. Labels like Nacional Records, the forward-thinking U.S.-based Latin alternative imprint, helped to solidify this new movement. They housed luminary groups like Nortec Collective, a DJ/producer crew from Tijuana who mash-up norteñas and techno; the feisty Bomba Estéreo, who took electro-cumbias outside of Colombia; and French-Chilean rapper/poetess Ana Tijoux, who brought silky smooth rap verses that resonate across the diaspora. Others like ZZK Records—the Buenos Aires digital cumbia collective that began as an underground party—gathered electro-folk-minded DJ/producers like Chancha via Circuito, Frikstailers, and Lagartigeando. Santiago’s Quemasucabeza capitalized on the aforementioned rising electro-pop scene of Chile. And Monterrey, Mexico had its own alternative boom called la avanzada regia (a scene the channeled a similar spirit as Seattle’s grunge movement). It birthed the wild dance rock of Plastilina Mosh, Control Machete’s vicious rap-punk, and the electro-rock brilliance of Kinky.
With the Latin alternative ethos well established, the ever-elastic umbrella continues to mold, expand, and morph into further subgroups. This decade, spectators have witnessed the rise of the singer.songwriter—through Carla Morrison’s wounded confections, Ximena Sariñana’s heartbreaking jazz-pop, or Natalia Lafourcade’s rustic pop elegance. And while Latin trap, reggaetón, and all-things urban keep topping the mainstream charts, underground rap prodigies like Princess Nokia, cholo-goths Prayers, and R&B soulstress Kali Uchis formed a resistance to commercialism, adopting an unflinching mindset that’s on par with the Latin alternative philosophy. Cumbia-gothics (La MiniTK Del Miedo), indie-mambo prodigies (Orkesta Mendoza), Brooklyn baile funk (Zuzuka Poderosa), and unruly punk norteños (e.g. A Band of Bitches, Juan Cirerol)—the beauty of Latin alternative is that it will never be restricted to one beat or style.
The 20th century saw a verdant tapestry of sounds emerging from Brazil, presenting a rich variety of approaches to the essential rhythmic underpinnings in South American music that constantly evolved with the political landscape of the times. But of the many different styles and perspectives that Brazil has gifted us over the years, none are so enchanting, so tranquil, and so forlorn as the smooth sound of bossa nova music.Exemplified by its jazzy sense of repose and shuffling nylon-guitar picking, bossa nova was coined by João Gilberto in the mid-1950s when he wrote the amusingly slight “Bim-Bom,” a representation of the women he would see passing by the São Francisco river with loads of laundry balanced on their heads, the baskets swaying with their hips in a delightful rhythm. The genre would spawn a cross-cultural musical conversation, with local heroes like Antônio Carlos Jobim and Bola Sete mingling with American converts like Vince Guaraldi and Stan Getz, leading to an increased interest in the genre throughout the ‘60s that eventually culminated in Brazil’s psychedelia-fuelled Tropicália movement.Though those unfamiliar with bossa nova may relegate it to the forsaken category of lounge music, its sound is subtle and powerful, as demanding of its musicians as it is accommodating for the listener, evoking the tender beauty of nature in the same breath that it laments the simple pains and heartbreak of everyday life. It may have fallen by the wayside as Brazilian music continued to blossom into other exciting shapes and colors over the years, but the magic of bossa nova is that its calming spirit can resonate with anybody curious enough to gaze a little more closely into its winsome foliage.
On January 26, Texan trio Khruangbin release their second album, Con Todo El Mundo (on Dead Oceans), a supremely chilled fusion of classic funk grooves, sun-dazed psychedelia, and global influences spanning Mexico to the Middle East to South Asia. For their Dowsers playlist, the band open up their deep crates to recreate the soundtrack to a recent magical moment in India. "After playing our first Indian festival, we were lucky to enough to see the turning of the new year in Goa. These songs were the perfect company on the beach. Were trying to bring the Indian sun and warmth to any wintery grey places through this mix, which includes some of our favorites from all over the globe."—Khruangbin
Whats This Playlist About?: In the words of musical polymath David Byrne, "I assume I dont have to explain where the shithole reference came from." This is the avid cyclist/art-pop masterminds thoughtful way of exposing some of musics brightest talents from what some people (ahem, certin presidents) deem the bleakest of locales. More from Byrne: "Heres a playlist that gives just the smallest sample of the depth and range of creativity that continues to pour out of the countries in Africa and the Caribbean… can music help us empathize with its makers?"What You Get: A whole lot of fantastically funky rhythms and sun-soaked celebrations that are undeniably infectious. Byrne starts and ends in the Caribbean, with the 60s-rock-infused Cuban pop of Los Van Van, the dizzying drums of Irakere, and the heart-pumping beats of Haitian greats like Michel Martelly. But he spends most of his time exploring the rich, rhythmic traditions of the African continent, from Mali duo Amadou & Mariams hypnotic Afro-blues to Senegalese band Orchestra Baobabs smooth Afro-Cuban grooves.Greatest Discovery: Jupiter & Okwess’ fusion of slick Congolese rhythms and sizzling psychedelic guitar, with some fresh keyboard work from Damon Albarn.Will This Inspire You to Catch the Next Flight Out to a Beautiful Shithole? For sure. And if you can’t quite do that, it will at least have you daydreaming of stunning subequatorial sunsets and crazy fun dance parties——all pleasantly far away from this D.C. shithole.
Whats This Playlist All About? This musical companion to the new PBS/Independent Lens documentary Winnie——which follows the life of Winnie Mandela and her heroic fight against apartheid——offers an extensive survey of South Africas most powerful protest anthems and stirring tales of murder and mourning.What You Get: A rich but intense education on one of modern historys darkest hours, and how music can be the most potent fuel in powering a revolution. Curator Sarah Bardeen starts the experience with Miriam Makebas steely yet steady interpretation of Vuyisile Minis "Beware, Verwoerd!," a daring rebuke directed straight at South African prime minister Hendrik Verwoerd. She then spotlights harrowing choir laments (Lalela Cape Town Choir’s "Thina Sizwe"), fiery jazz movements (Hugh Masekela’s "Sharpville"), rousing youth chants (Chicago Children’s Choir’s "Toyi Toyi"), and even a few notable supporters from unlikely places, like Paul Simon and The Specials.Greatest Discovery: The playlists evocative final track, "Senzeni Na," which translates as "What have we done?" Its placement at the end of this mix is telling: This is a struggle and a fight that is far from over.Most Uplifting Song: For such a tragic topic, theres a whole lot of infectious spirit running through this mix, including Ladysmith Black Mambazo’s "Nkosi Sikelel iAfrika" ("God bless Africa").How Can You Learn More?: See Bardeens full article on the inspiring stories behind her song selections here.
Described by Guitar Girl Magazine as "a Latin artist who combines hypnotic, electronic funk with alternative and psychedelic styles," DeAnza recently released her concept EP Cosmic Dream on June 29. The collection of tracks and interludes designed to take you on a sonic journey through the various sleep cycles. To continue celebrating that release and her subsequent tour, we asked her to make us a playlist thats as eclectic as her style. Listen here.Says DeAnza: "I went through several playlist ideas in my head before deciding to create a list that’s as eclectic as the music I listen to. Duke Ellington said, there are only two kinds of music – good and bad. I created a list that consists of what I believe to be good music, regardless of the genre or era. All of these artists have inspired me in some form or another."What you’ll get: Some classics, witchy women who I idolize, singers who blow my mind, couple deep cuts and some Latin spice for those who want to hear something that isn’t Despacito."
If you’re mixing up a cool Brazilian cocktail to keep you from overheating this summer, here are a few essentials you’ll need to have on hand. Start with a little cachaça, some lime, and a pinch of sugar, then add a dash of samba, some bossa nova, and a touch of Tropicália if you really want to keep things on the cool side.Brazilians have never been strangers to sweltering, sun-baked days, and they’ve always known exactly how to counter all that heat—by crafting music that sounds and feels as if it’s lifting a breeze off of the ocean and sending it right in your direction. Sure, Brazilian musicians know how to work up a feverish intensity when the spirit moves them, but they’ve always been masters at maintaining a sub-zero level of chill. You can hear it in the supple, sensuous sounds of bossa nova originators Luiz Bonfá and João Gilberto. Then you can follow it through to the pioneers who gained stardom in the ’60s by putting their own slant on the style as part of the MPB (música popular brasileira) movement, like Elis Regina, Marcos Valle, and Edu Lobo.Even when forward-looking artists like Os Mutantes, Gal Costa, and Caetano Veloso started making headway in the Tropicália scene by blending Brazilian rhythms with elements of psychedelia, they still found plenty of ways to keep things breezy. In later years, the likes of Bebel Gilberto and Céu brought modern electronic touches into the mix, and singers like Luciana Souza swept in with a jazz influence, but they still served up the sort of sounds that would work just right in combination with a cool caipirinha lifted to your lips on a sultry summer afternoon.
Thirty years ago, Chile returned to democracy after being shackled by the dictatorship of General Augusto Pinochet for 17 years. Under his oppressive regime, Pinochet put a deadly hault on numerous forms of artistic expression — one of its most famous (atrocious) examples was the kidnapping and murder of protest folk singer Victor Jara who helped lead the New Chilean Song Movement of the late Sixties, early Seventies. You see, Chilean music wasn’t allowed to be political, or much less, criticise its government. Enter Los Prisioneros, a Chilean pop rock band with a knack for glossy anthemic hooks became one of the most defiant groups of their generation. Formed in the late Seventies, the San Miguel band’s early songs proved to be controversial in a time of extreme censorship, so their music gained popularity through labeless cassette distribution. Eighties songs like “El Baile De Los Que Sobran” and “De La Cultura De La Basura testified them as working class heroes with a rebellious spirit who know how to expertly navigate their way around insatiable synth melodies and catchy drum machines made for the dance floor. This era was also the height of the rock en español explosion in Latin America, so their rosy-hued disco pop wasn’t as welcoming in the mainstream — who demanded more rock guitars and, seemingly, pretentious frontmen — a vast departure from the scrappy, socially discontent group Los Prisioneros were known as. So when their fourth studio album dropped, 1990’s Corazones, it wasn’t an instant hit for the reasons aforementioned, yet it slowly became a South American legacy. It also marked a critical time in Chilean history when it was at a crossroads. Part autobiographical, part social-commentary, the record poignantly reflects the stigmas of Chile’s disenfranchised population, and it emotionally evoked the turmoil of an overwhelming transition in politics, all over sleek electronic pulses and intoxicating synth riffs. Songs like “Tren Al Sur” and “Estrechez de Corazón” pack one hell of a rhythm too that lends itself to high-gloss dance rock with a socially political edge. It’s a style that decades later would inspire hordes of Chilean pop groups like Javiera Mena, Alex Anwandter, and Dënver — bands that too fight battles of classism while demanding LGBTQ+ rights over disco-inflected dance pop. The early 2010s saw the first latest explosion of Chilean pop, and it traveled around the globe, a sort of electropop manifesto pioneered by Los Prisioneros.
Like so many great record companies, Greensleeves was a record shop before it was a label. Founded in the London neighborhood of Shepherd’s Bush by former accountant Chris Cracknell and a DJ from Norfolk named Chris Sedgwick, the shop spent two years building up a reputation as the place to find the tastiest island imports. Then in 1977, its owners made the shift to producing music in the UK themselves. The Greensleeves label made its debut with a 7-inch by Dr. Alimantado, a singer and toaster who was already finding favor with the city’s safety-pinned tastemakers thanks to DJ Don Letts and his punk-reggae parties at The Roxy. The arrival of Alimantado’s album The Best Dressed Chicken in Town—a high watermark for producer Lee “Scratch” Perry and for reggae in general—established Greensleeves as the real deal.Of the British labels that were instrumental in building a global audience for Jamaican music, Island and Trojan arguably retain greater name-brand cachet, partially because they arrived on the scene earlier than Cracknell and Sedgwick did. But Greensleeves may be the most influential due to the sheer gravity and diversity of its releases, as well as its ability to spread the hottest trends far and wide. Even before the label began, the store had a predilection for emergent sounds that had yet to enter the mainstream, its clientele largely turning up their noses at Bob Marley’s big sellers in favor of Gregory Isaacs and Dennis Brown. Greensleeves’ quest for freshness would reap the greatest dividends when Cracknell and Sedgwick made a fortuitous alliance with Henry “Junjo” Lawes, the producer and label owner who became the standard-bearer for dancehall in the 1980s. The ensuing cavalcade of new stars—Eek-A-Mouse, Barrington Levy, Yellowman, Beenie Man, Ninjaman—would all become part of the Greensleeves story.Whereas the rock audiences that Island cultivated with Marley were wary of Jamaica’s increasingly electronic sounds, Greensleeves devotees developed an insatiable appetite for the new riddims that arrived in the wake of landmark releases like Wayne Smith’s “Under Me Sleng Teng” in 1986, Shaggy’s “Oh Carolina” in 1993, and Wayne Wonder’s “No Letting Go” in 2003. Another spin on producer Steven “Lenky” Marsden’s ubiquitous Diwali riddim—which yielded hits for Wonder, Elephant Man, and Bounty Killer too—Sean Paul’s “Get Busy” was another monster hit for the label.Acquired by New York’s VP Records in 2008 but still prominent and prolific, Greensleeves hits the big 40 this summer, celebrating with anniversary concerts in Paris, New York, and London. Given that their back catalog contains over 500 albums (with an impressively high ratio of winners), any salute to Greensleeves is bound to be a tip-of-the-iceberg kind of gesture. But surely a taste of riddim is better than no riddim at all.Click here to follow this playlist on Spotify.
The ’90s have never sounded better than they do right now—especially for modern-day indie rockers. There’s no shortage of bands banging around these days whose sound suggests formative phases spent soaking up vintage ’90s indie rock. Not that the neo-’90s sound is itself a new thing. As soon as the era was far enough away in the rearview mirror to allow for nostalgia to set in (i.e., the second half of the 2000s), there were already some young artists out there onboarding ’90s alt-rock influences. But more recently, there’s been a bumper crop of bands that betray a soft spot for a time when MTV still played music videos and streaming was just something that happened in a restroom. In this context, the literate, lo-fi approach of Pavement has emerged as a particularly strong strand of the ’90s indie tapestry, and it isn’t hard to hear echoes of their sound in the work of more recent arrivals like Kiwi jr. or Teenage Cool Kids. Cherry Glazerr frontwoman Clementine Creevy seems to have a feeling for the kind of big, dirty guitar riffs that made Pacific Northwestern bands the kings of the alt-rock heap once upon a time. The world-weary, wise-guy angularity of Car Seat Headrest can bring to mind the lurching, loose-limbed attack of Railroad Jerk. And laconic, storytelling types like Nap Eyes stand to prove that there’s still a bright future ahead for those who mourn the passing of Silver Jews main man David Berman. But perhaps the best thing about a face-off between the modern indie bands evoking ’90s forebears and the old-school artists themselves is the fact that in this kind of competition, everybody wins.
It may be that 2019 was the best year for ’90s metal since, well, 1999. Bands from the decade of Judgment Night re-emerged with new creative twists and tweaks: Tool stretched out into polyrhythmic madness, Korn bludgeoned with more extreme and raw despair, Slipknot added a new drummer (Max Weinberg’s kid!) who gave them a new groove, and Rammstein wrote an anti-fascism anthem that caused controversy in Germany (and hit No. 1 there too). Elsewhere, icons of the era returned in unique ways: Nine Inch Nails’ Trent Reznor scored a superhero TV series, Primus’ Les Claypool teamed up with Sean Lennon for some quirky psych rock, and Faith No More’s Mike Patton made an avant-decadent LP with ’70s soundtrack king Jean-Claude Vannier. Finally, the soaring voice of Linkin Park’s Chester Bennington returned for a moment thanks to Lamb of God guitarist Mark Morton, who released a song they recorded together in 2017.
Taking a look at the playlists for my show on Boston’s WZBC might give the more seasoned college-radio listener a bit of déjà vu: They’re filled with bands like Versus, Team Dresch, and Sleater-Kinney, who were at the top of the CMJ charts back in the ’90s. But the records they released in 2019 turned out to be some of the year’s best rock. Versus, whose Ex Nihilo EP and Ex Voto full-length were part of a creative run for leader Richard Baluyut that also included a tour by his pre-Versus outfit Flower and his 2000s band +/-, put out a lot of beautifully thrashy rock; Team Dresch returned with all cylinders blazing and singers Jody Bleyle and Kaia Wilson wailing their hearts out on “Your Hands My Pockets”; and Sleater-Kinney confronted middle age head-on with their examination of finding one’s footing, The Center Won’t Hold.Italian guitar heroes Uzeda—who have been putting out proggy, riff-heavy music for three-plus decades—released their first record in 13 years, the blistering Quocumque jerceris stabit; Imperial Teen, led by Faith No More multi-instrumentalist Roddy Bottum, kept the weird hooks coming with Now We Are Timeless; and high-concept Californians That Dog capped off a year of reissues with Old LP, their first album since 1997. Juliana Hatfield continued the creative tear she’s been on this decade with two albums: Weird, a collection of hooky, twisty songs that tackle alienation with searing wit, and Juliana Hatfield Sings the Police, her tribute record to the dubby New Wave chart heroes (in the spirit of the salute to Olivia Newton-John she released in 2018). And our playlist finishes with Mary Timony, formerly of the gnarled rockers Helium and currently part of the power trio Ex Hex, paying tribute to her former Autoclave bandmate Christina Billotte via an Ex Hex take on “What Kind of Monster Are You?,” one of the signature songs by Billotte’s ’90s triple threat Slant 6.
