Culture Shock MP3s From Doug

MP3s: 20 of them contained in this post.

Disco from India? Doo-Wop from Malawi? Rap from Vietnam? Salsa from Scotland? With bagpipes?

They're all included here in the online version of Doug Schulkind's 2004 marathon premium, Culture Shock. Dont pass up this amazing collection of jaw-dropping, mind jarring cross-cultural music hybrids. Eighty minutes of melodious map-melters that set the world on its ears. A bonus: The music is not just goofy, it's good!

1. Salsa Celtica - Fuerte
Combining rumba with reels, son montuno with ceilidh tunes, this Scottish conflagration has the hots for Latin music. And speaking of hot, check out the scorching bagpipes - doing the violin's charanga part no less - on this track from 2000. Download MP3

2. The King Elio Boom - El Fulo
Identified as "highlife ragga" on the disc this comes from, "El Fulo" has more in common with Congolese soukous. It's a slice of funk typical of the champeta created by the African-music-crazed youth of Baranquilla and other port cities on Columbia's Caribbean coast. Download MP3

3. S.P. Balasubramaniyam - I Want To
This versatile playback crooner has made 36,000 recordings - singing in eight languages - for South Indian film soundtracks. This disco-tinged number, from the 1987 Tamil-language film "Aanand," features a chorus in smarmiest English. Download MP3

4 "Obeng Ungu & Alan Buntu" - Rabu: Sakit Tangani, Sabtu: Sakit Pantat
Electronica trickster Matt Wand, best known for his work as part of Stock, Hausen and Walkman, is purportedly behind this ersatz ethnic music. It was released as part of an extraordinary hoax recording titled "1951: Sumatran Ladies Wearing Hats as Outlawed by Government." (One website I found reveals that Obeng Ungu translates as "purple screwdriver.") Whatever its origins, this track is a prime example of that peculiar postmodern genre: smartass white boys making faux field recordings of faraway places. Download MP3

5. Ly Ngua O - Vo Chong Lam Bieng
There seems to be some confusion about the name of this busker recorded on the streets of Saigon, who, by the sound of it, is an appreciator of the spare, beatbox-driven hip-hop of the early eighties. (It's doubtful that the fellow's name really is "Ly Ngua O," since this just happens to be the title of the famous Vietnamese tune "Song of the Black Horse.") Download MP3

6. The 524 - Do You Got Skills
Equal parts Tang Dynasty and Wu Tang Clan, this Hong Kong crew drops rhymes in Cantonese, Teochiu, and Mandarin. English is also part of its arsenal. MC Chairman Plow explains his moniker: "The gun is my mouth and when I open it to rap, it goes plow! plow! plow!" Download MP3

7. Gelongal - Cheikh Anta Diop
The eminent African historian Diop is paid homage here by young rappers Papi Baba, Bathie, Do and Balla from his native Senegal. This intriguing number from 1999 includes a stunning cameo from fellow countryman Baaba Maal (see track #15). Download MP3

8. Yoon Il-Loh - Guitar Boogie
No information is available on this Korean tune, though I have a theory: In 1953, Ernest Tubb and His Troubadours performed for troops stationed in Korea (at open-air concerts within range of enemy guns!). Was Tubbs's longtime lead guitarist Leon Rhodes, on that tour? Was "Leon's Guitar Boogie" in the band's songbook at that time? Was Mr. Yoon in the audience? Download MP3

9. Ignace De Souza & The Melody Aces - Asaw Fofor
Souza was a trumpeter from Benin producing standard-issue highlife until he broke out as a leader of several bands playing tunes associated with American dance crazes. This twist, sung in Fanti, was recorded in 1962. Download MP3

10. De Ndirande Pitch Crooners - Elube
Recorded in Malawi in 1958, this head-scratcher tells the story of Elube, a gal with "beautiful curved legs, eyes white as rice, and a face shining like the moon." More interesting, though, is the appeal of sentimental Hawaiian pop in this tiny East African country where a generation of guitarists came up playing
bottle-neck Hauyani ("Hawaiian") style. Download MP3

11. Los Zafiros - Cuando Yo La Conoci
Here's another number - a doo-wop/calypso - about libidinal cravings for an attractive female, done by Havana heartthrobs whose Motown-style choreography and impeccable voices kept the palms of Cuban girls moist for much of the sixties. Download MP3

12. Lalo Guerrero Y Sus Concos Lobos - Muy Sabroso Blues
For a period in the fifties, Chicano R&B was all the rage in the dancehalls of the American Southwest, thanks, in part to this hipster who was best known, in some circles, as the author of the infamous "Marijuana Boogie." Download MP3

13. Manhattan Brothers - Marie
Damned if Nathan Mdledle - lead singer with this Inkspots style South African quartet - doesn't sound a lot like Louis Prima on this 1953 version of Irving Berlin's chestnut. Around the same time, a young Miriam Makeba got her start singing with the Brothers. Download MP3

14. Comedian Harmonists - Der Alte Cowboy
Called "Jewish-Marxist noise" by the Nazis in 1932, this German singing supergroup broke up two years later after it was prohibited from performing due to the non-Aryan heritage of half its members. This piece of fluff was recorded a month before the split. Download MP3

15. Babba Maal - Bess, You Is My Woman Now
Conceived in 1998 for the Gershwin-themed "Red Hot + Rhapsody" compilation - released as part of the Red Hot Organization's series of AIDS fund raising projects - this may be the most exquisite version of this "Porgy and Bess" standard ever recorded. Not bad for a Senegalese megastar. Download MP3

16. Gal Costa - Tuareg
"Tuareg" is an inauthentic name for the various tribes of the Saharan region given by North African Muslim marauders. It's an insulting Arabic term meaning "the Godforsaken." It's also the name of this Jorge Ben tune, recorded in 1969 by the Queen of the Tropicalia scene, that mashes up Brazilian psychedelia with the trippy desert music familiar to the people the song is named for. Download MP3

17. Gerson King Combo - Mandamentos Black
A native of Rio, Gerson Cortes, who took his stage name in homage to the King Curtis Combo, was enthralled with African-American music. And, like a legion of young black musicians around the world, he was inspired to imitate the Godfather of Soul. When this was released in 1977, it was for the Brazilian division of Polydor, the same label that recorded James Brown in the U.S. On his next record, Gerson chose to copy a different cat: Barry White. Download MP3

18. Yasukatsu Ohshima & Orquesta Bore - Ikawu
Dominated by the samba drumming of Yasuhiro Yoshigaki, leader of the brass quintet Orquesta Bore, this 1997 number is a Brazilified cover of the hit, by the hugely popular girl group Nenes, which virtually
launched the Okinawan Pop craze. Download MP3

19. The Fujii - Miss You / Midnight Train
Kuichi Fujishima is half of the duo the Fujii (with Paul Shearsmith, who plays pocket trumpet and "tuned gain main.") Along with Andy Allan's harmonica, this 2001 tune features Fujishima on National
Steel guitar channeling his hero, Mississippi Fred McDowell. Download MP3

20. Kante Manfila - Kankan Blue
Searching for the roots of the blues in Africa is a bogus exercise. African blues players are more recipient than inspiration in this particular cultural cross-pollination. Mali's Ali Farka Toure may be called "the African John Lee Hooker," but he's never played anything remotely as gripping and beautiful as this. Recorded in Manfila's hometown of Kankan in 1987. Download MP3

This collection was created as a gift for listeners and supporters of WFMU and my show Give the Drummer Some. Many thanks for help and suggestions go to: Paul Sherratt, Monica Lynch, Robin Edgerton, Rob Weisberg, David Suisman and Mike Lupica. For more info, go to www.wfmu.org/~doug.

- Doug Schulkind

Comments

[rabies]

why don't provide a link to download them all at once?

[Stephen Down]

Oh yes thanks Doug!

I was blown away when OCDJ played The 524 from this disc, now I can blow myself away.

[rentstrike]

I can't believe that anybody is complaining about anything. This is a beautiful compilation and a wonderful gift. And, in any event, downloading each track individually prompts one to read each entry carefully, which one really should do since so much care was taken to make them informative.

[BrightMoments]

Wonderful gift Doug and thanks for posting Ken! One more example of why WFMU is the best station around and Doug's "Give the Drummer Some" a must listen.

"Obeng Ungu & Alan Buntu" - Rabu: Sakit Tangani, Sabtu: Sakit Pantat, is my fav transitional "background button" on many of your programs; thrilled to have this and the rest!

Bright Moments!

[Tim]

The song 524 do you got skills is being used by Clearchannel Communications recently. Do you know who or how to get a version of the song without the singing, I just want the music track part if possible.

[Snoopy]

Greetings. Thank you very much, but can you do a favor, and re-rip #19 by The Fuji? It seems to have been cut off several seconds before it ended. Thanks

[TETSU]

thank you very much for this Ken and Doug. am in the process of downloading but they look really good! can't wait to listen to them all.

[yassiçne]

Beautiful works !

To complete that, I also have

yodel reggae
doowop-bollywood
algerian rap
african trash metal

If anyone is interrested just tell me.
i'll send you a mp3.

Yassine
aka
Dj Alfred Hitchcock magazine
CHOCOMIX
Laboratoire de recherches scientifiques sur la fête
[email protected]

[Rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrobbbbbbbbbbbbb]

So, what group is that pictured in the very beginning? with the Culture Shock label across the photo?

thanks,
Rob

[Julian]

Huh? I have this Premium CD, but it ain't got no 'Yasukatsu Ohshima & Orquesta Bore' on it!
Still, an INCREDIBLE selection from all over that somehow still fits together beautifully - just like the show itself.
Cheers Doug!

[Jeff]

A spectacular collection, but I second Snoopy's request-- please re-rip # 19 by the Fuji-- the sound cuts off around 4:49 and then you get a 5 and a half minute track that ends with 40 seconds of very frustrating silence.

[Station Manager Ken]

I'll be re-ripping track 19 this Friday, July 8th. Should be repaired by the end of that day. -ken

[poesboes]

Can i make a 2004 'retro-pledge' to get this beautiful collection on CD? If there are any copies left...

[panasianbiz]

I stumbled across your blog while I was doing some online research. As someone who had the privilege of living in Japan for a number of years prior to returning to the United States, I have been exposed to many different kinds of music. I wish that more people would expose themselves to the rich variety of music that is available to us all through sites such as this.

[avaleigh]

Jamaica embraces white female reggae Artist from the U.K check it out at Avaleigh.co.uk
And get free music.