Dan Bodah's Best of 2007

A few of the many really good records that came out in 2007:

Akron/Family, Love is Simple

A truly ridiculous record that basically blends together everything that is right about shambling hippies chanting around a campfire in the woods, stomping up and down to the most primitive driving rhythms around, the baroque multi-room mansion approach of prog rock songwriting, and dust floating in the morning light pouring in beside a steaming cup of tea.  It makes absolutely perfect sense from the word go.

 

The Art of Field Recording, Vol. 1: 50 Years of Traditional American Music
Documented by Art Rosenbaum

I've just started to dig into this 4-CD set of direct, raw recordings of the real American culture that still actively bubbles away under the onslaught of synthetic crapola on the popular charts. This is the first of a contemplated set of 3 volumes from the good folks at Dust-to-Digital Records.  God bless them.

 

Omar Souleyman, Highway to Hassake

A collection of brash Syrian dabke pop music on the inimitable Sublime Frequencies label, purveyors of fine peaks into far-flung street cultures.

 

 

Lexie Mountain, Boys (and all other Lexie Mountain Boys CDRs)

Like a psychotic glee club hopped up on Yoko Ono and Monty Python, the Lexie Mountain Boys officially conquered the world in 2007 with the #1 WFMU a capella hit "Dogs Hot" (MP3) and their performance at the WFMU Record Fair in November.

 

Talibam!, Ordination of the Globetrotting Conscripts

Free rock attack jazz comes on like a tornado and leaves like a tsunami.

 

 

A few more:  Chicha Libre's "Amazonicas" and the "Roots of Chicha" compilation on Barbes Records; Taureg and desert rock from Tinariwen, Tartit, Group Inerane, Etran Finatawa, Group Doueh; The ongoing madness that is the Ethiopiques series; William Parker & Raining on the Moon's "Corn Meal Dance"; and Throbbing Gristle's "The Endless Not" (a great album regardless of all the anti/hype).