When you listen to the “Gypsy Groove” CD, a new disc from Putamayo, you are presented with a cornucopia of styles of music from across the sea. World music is exactly what it’s called and it will inject some fresh forms and styles of music into your record collection or MP3 player.
Of the 11 songs on the “Gypsy Groove,” three focus the listener’s attention. The first song, “Balkan Beat Box,” opens with a contemporary drum machine beat that would easily be right at home with P-Funk or Sly and the Family Stone. This is a very danceable song that stays on-the-one till the end of the song, and includes some good harmonized horns.
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Seed Newsvine
To coin a cliché: if there wasn'ta group like Radio Tarifa already, you would have to invent one. The affinities between North African and Spanish gypsy music are so overt as not to need any sophisticated World MusicPR exercise in product placement. The similarities just scream out at you when you listen to traditional airs like "Jota Bereber" or the wonderful version of Tarifa's self-composed classic from the album of the same name,"Cruzando el Rio".
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Classic gypsies meet contemporary gypsies in a new Crammed Records comp, Electric Gypsyland 2. Containing reinventions and reinterpretations of 16 tracks by three Balkan Gypsy bands (Taraf de Haïdouks, Koççani Orkestar, Mahala Raï Banda) on the Belgian label , the album includes contributions from Animal Collective, Nouvelle Vague, Tunng, Cibelle, and 43 Skidoo (which is, according to the Crammed website "a fleeting reincarnation of the similarly named cult 80s band"), plus remixes by fusionists and Balkan club mainstays Shantel, Balkan Beat Box, Oi Va Voi, Smadj, DJ ClicK, Forty Thieves Orkestar, Gaetano Fabri, Russ Jones, and Russendisko.
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