Al compás del mundo - programa #96 - Potpourri Planet Bounce Baby!

 

Reporting from San Francisco this week, though the program up was conjured in the town of Tequisquiapan, in the state of Queretaro, in the country of old Mexico. And this bi-national effort hopes to make the world an even smaller place by bouncing around the planet, sampling sounds of disparate peoples, hither and yon, speaking in voices that are ever more familiar due to promotions of unity and acceptance blah, blah, blah. What have we in common with human beings on the other side of the globe? Maybe there’s a clue found in the segues from song to song. Legions of listeners to Al compas del mundo have pestered me with one basic question: “What’s up with those segues?” So let’s take a closer look. There’s most definitely a logic behind selections, despite the apparent randomness one might perceive. A perfect example will be the current playlist.

To begin: Baby Huey was one of my favorite cartoon characters as a kid growing up in the 1950’s – a perfect place to start. “War’s” a proper follow up as we fast-forward to the present. Timely and topical. “Eighteen with a Bullet” continues the R&B groove and threat of violence. Robert Hill offers comic relief to lower the heat: “I can tell by your shape, you look just like an ape”. Insults are all the rage these days. Songs 5, 6, and 7 veer off into the African continent with sounds that electronica can only hope to render. Actually, Cheik Hamada’s piece matches up pretty closely with the melody laid out by Robert Hill – segue! Two fanfares from the Balkan regions up next as they offer a twin attack on quietude and subtle rhythms. Step up and step out. As we slide into a live cumbia by a group I never thought I’d play, Mexico’s Los Angeles Negros. Nothing wrong with them, but typically I find them too commercial. But screw it! This song moves me in a simple and effective way and it’s coming in. To be followed by another cumbia from the motherland, Colombia. Time to liven things up again? Tamikrest playing “desert blues” as it’s been labelled, shows that the Sahara region isn’t as desolate and backward as Westerners may be led to believe. And did I expect from Sudan (war there too) studio work as complex and successful as ReXus’s “Am Gorun”? Ethiopia’s right next door so Gigi works the segue trick. From Kenya come the Yahoo Boys, continuing an East African riff. And then we jerk to the far East which may seem like a leap, but contemporary Uyghur music from China could pass for most any modern music – yes, commercial – and it seemed like a good fit after several “modern” works of music from elsewhere. Kutumba from Nepal? Asian and mellow. A leisurely stroll out the door of this week’s program. - J.H.

 Runlist for a potpourri first broadcast 9-28-23

01 Baby Huey - Hard Times (USA)

02 Edwin Starr- War (USA)

03 Pete Wingfield - Eighteen with a Bullet (England)

04 Robert Hill - You Gonna Look Like a Monkey When You Get Old (USA)

05 Cheik Hamada - Yaben Sidi (Algeria)

06 Musique du Burundi – Akazehe (Burundi)

07 Madosini - Modokali 2 (Uhadi-Breimbau) (South Africa)

08 Fanfara Tirana and Transglobal Underground - No Guns to the Wedding (Albania and England)

09 Fanfare Ciocarlia - Iag Bari (Romania)

10 Los Ángeles Azules, featuring Pablo Lescano - La Cumbia del Infinito (Mexico and Argentina)

11 Los Guacharacos de Colombia - El cafetero (Colombia)

12 Tamikrest - Djanegh etoumast (Tuareg, Mali)

13 ReXus with Mo Rezeqi - Am Gorun (Sudan) ريكسوس × مو رزيقي - أم قرون

14 Gigi - Nana Enji (Ethiopia)

15 Hafusa Abasi and The Yahoo Boys - Sina Raha (Kenya)

16 Shahrizoda - Guzel Ertek (Uyghur, China)

17 Kutumba - Farewell (Nepal)

Rexus from Sudan