Monoswezi is so interesting conceptually that it’s easy to focus only on that: This collective of musicians from Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Norway and Sweden interweave Southern African traditions with jazz, contemporary classical and soul under a moniker that means “One World.” And you can certainly hear all those influences: sax swells dancing with plinking mbiras on “Hondo,” the slinking bass and interlocking percussion on “Mapfunde,” the funked-up marimbas of “Heya!” But be sure to also get out of your head and let the gorgeous, quietly complex sound that concept generates just wash over you.
The Creole Choir of Cuba project has always been fascinating, a multi-level musical creolization -- filtering Afro-Cuban-Haitian music through African and Western choir traditions -- that can feel a little stifled by choral-music stuffiness. But on Santiman, that concept has bloomed into a warm, captivating sound that takes off in a host of new hybrid directions. The lilting vocals of the female choir and the rawer-voiced male soloist wrap around dynamic Santeria dialogues; sunny, easy son jams; and mournful, jazz-tinged Afro-Caribbean blues. You're gonna want to dig into "Pou Ki Ayiti Kriye."
So you thought Ballaké Sissoko's Chamber Music with Vicent Segal was a quiet, intimate affair? Check out the kora player on his own, practicing being At Peace. It goes without saying that this album is gorgeously, lushly hushed, but there's a kind of magic that settles in as you lose yourself in the meditative waterfalls of the kora (and the occasional marimba and even, on the playful "Kalata Diata," fiddle) -- a magic that comes only of feeling like you're being invited to witness a private, meditative moment. Only the slightly bland new age pop of "Asa Branca" breaks the spell.
The mark of a great fado singer is that she can convince you of anything: That her heart is breaking. That her desire is so fervent she could just die. And most of all, that anything can be a fado. Ana Moura is just such a singer, and she proves it with an album that turns anything and everything into brooding passion: The oompahing but sexy "Amor Afoito." Joni Mitchell's "A Case of You." Even English tunes like "Dream of You" that verge on smooth jazz (Herbie Hancock on keys helps). Because a great fadista can also make you fall hard, even for songs you aren't sure you like.
Remember once upon a time, when cumbia was just a lilting, shuffling little folkloric rhythm? Yeah, we don't, either. But the stuff this DJ duo makes sounds like cumbia hopped in a Delorean, went to the future and came back to find everything changed. It's still the same warm, familiar rhythm we know and love, just ... different, somehow. That shuffle is screwed and chopped, diced up and hot-glued back together with bits of dub, kuduro, baile funk, dancehall, hip-hop, and a whole sticky mess of house-y, techno-laced electro-beats. "Murga del Guachin" is ready for your next party playlist.
Like any world pop band worth its post-cultural hyphen, Red Baraat makes albums that are like globe-snaking street parties. And the bhangra-n-brass band's second album is a fairly accurate recreation of their kinetic, eclectic live shows. Shruggy Ji bounces from NOLA jazz to Afrofunk to hip-hop, with the chunka-chunka bhangra beat bumping along underneath. But while cuts like "Burning Instinct" are as inviting as a Mardi Gras parade or Diwali party (those invigorating cymbals!), elsewhere the band can feel a bit restrained by the time and space constraints of the album format.
"You're really easy to love," goes the jovial chorus to these Seattle folk-pop upstarts' best tune, and with sweet vocal harmonies redolent of Fleet Foxes and a wiggly guitar hook worthy of George Harrison, the feeling is mutual. Kicking around for years before The Lumineers' meteoric rise and primed now to capitalize, the quartet mixes the earthy grit of hometown cohorts The Head and the Heart with the soft-rock slickness of Midlake, alongside a puppy-love vibe evident from the very first line: "I wanna be the man/ Who gets you all the presents underneath your Christmas tree." Aww.
Vybz Kartel has spent his career poised on the verge of breakthrough, and Gaza for Life is no different. Tracks alternate between serious (and, of course, sexed-up) dancehall and, well, slightly more pop-leaning serious, sexed-up dancehall. But where exactly these two strains pop up is what makes this album surprising. "Turn Up the F*ck," for instance, is riddled with pop hooks, while "Freaky Girl Part 3" is actually a very sweet slow jam. But Kartel is really at his best when he sticks to the hard-rolling dancehall riddims, as on the bombastic "Tun & Wine" or the fierce "Better Can Wuk."
A year without the love Protoje wants to “Come My Way” is like “a room full of weed and don’t give me no light,” the reggae star croons on his second album. That line, reggae-cliche as it is, homes in on the core nugget of Protoje’s appeal: He draws deeply off rasta-lite rhetoric but pulls it off with sexy charm and general adorableness. He litters tracks with pop hooks (“Shot by Love” with Toi could be a Rihanna hit) and quirky beats (“Who Dem a Program”) but tempers them with tunes that actively participate in shaping his genre. In short, he’s a perfect ambassador for modern reggae.
Brazilian chanteuse Dom La Nena has a voice so wispy and beguilingly breathy, you wonder she doesn't hyperventilate. Plus, she's a cellist, so you know what you get on her debut: whimsy by the vintage bicycle-load. Dark circus waltzes with girlish voices tread familiar terrain, and the café breeziness of "Buenos Aires" is so iconic, you can picture the bereted child at a nearby zoo. But she interjects that loveliness with serious sensuality, like the title track's spent expirations or "O Vento," a fairyland haunted by lurking strings that sounds like some kind of gorgeous, enviable nightmare.
Delhi 2 Dublin's third album sounds driven by the idea that life is about the journey. Neither of the group's titular locales is very prevalent in the mix. Instead, they party their way around the world, stressing throbbing beats and a dancefloor-sweat-slicked New Age-ry on multi-culti bangers like "iLove" that are only gently augmented by bhangra rhythms, twisty synth-sitars and the occasional Celtic fiddle. At times, it can feel like looking at endless pictures of someone else's trip, a diluted version of these sound-treks. But contemplative cuts like "Tabla Boy" are a pleasant ride.
Wow, could Celtic Thunder have picked a better name for this British Isles excursion? That name could sum up these nostalgic romantics' career, but this album in particular is an homage to the musical mythologies that frame the group's own aesthetic story: The first half is all sweeping aural spectacle and Ireland-on-ice showiness. But things get ... interesting with a straight-up cover of Aaron Copland's "Hoedown" that segues into Hollywood symphonies, Gregorian vocal jazz and even country. In short, it's the legend of Celtic Thunder, told through its musical touchstones.
