Spring has sprung, it seems, seeing as we've been waking up to partly sunny skies, leafy trees and chirpy birdsong these past days. The first four months of the year are in the books, prompting us to say: So long, April 2022! But before we fully turn our backs on you, here's our latest selection of our favourite releases and musical discoveries from the past month, now streaming exclusively in our Greedio channel on Spotify.
Our "Greedio X April '22" playlist opens with Jeremiah Chiu and Marta Sofia Honer's "Recordings from the Åland Islands" on International Anthem and continues with Brazilian singer Maria de Fátima's beautiful "Vocé", taken from her only solo album originally released in 1981 and now reissued on Altercat Records. We then head to Australia, where Melbourne-based artist Ajak Kwai joins forces with 30/70's Allysha Joy, giving "a voice to the local African community so that they can tell their stories through music and spoken word." Up next is the recent reissue of a rare hi-life and afro-funk masterpiece by Ghanaian singer Alhaji K. Frimpong and his Cubanos Fiesta on Hot Casa Records, which goes well with a track from the recent anthology of São Tomé cult formation África Negra.
We continue with Nigerian-born, London-based musician Loshh – who shared his mind-blowing debut EP "Ífaradá" in 2021 and only recently popped on our radar – and then hear Senegalese singer and bassist Alune Wade with a track off of his forthcoming fifth solo album "Sultan". After that we move on to Tel Aviv behind the Ethio-influenced funk and jazz of TIGRIS, followed by the Hamburg-based experimental and occult cumbia project Son de Huesos and the title track of Analog Africa's latest deep dive into the Mexican Rebajada sound system culture of the early '60s-'80s.
Berlin's Fun in the Church imprint recently unveiled a new collection of poetic, pre-revolutionary Iranian pop music by Touraj Shabankhani, alias Touraj, which paves the way to "Sowal Diabi: De Kaboul A Bamako", an ambitious project bringing together artists from different backgrounds who have all experienced exile, be it physical or cultural. Also going back to the "Roots" is Berlin-based producer, jazz and experimental artist Dale, who samples an early field recording of Pygmy music from 1946 to mesmerising effect. Hailing from Guinea Conakry, singer and percussionist Falle Nioke then shares the November 2021-released follow-up EP to his potent 2020 collaboration with Ghost Culture, aka James Greenwood, which is a fitting predecessor to the equally powerful musical mix of WEMA, aka New York-based electronic producer Photay, London's Afro-Latin dance band Penya and Tanzania's Msafiri Zawose.
Next, we hear the relentless Nacim Gastli remix of a track by Paris-based Tunisian DJ and producer Hazem B off his recent "Afrochawi" release on Shouka, and L.A.-based producer, DJ and vocalist Gingee's "Gong Spirits", taken from her 2015-released "Tambol" EP and included on Smithsonian Folkways Recordings' "Kulintang Kultura" homage to the late Danongan "Danny" Kalanduyan, who championed Filipino kulintang gong music in the US. Spanish reissue label just released a superb selection of leftfield synth pop, experimental folk and ambient tracks taken from the Argentinian Melopea Discos imprint as we hear a playful track by Comedia, before Armenian pianist extraordinaire, Tigran Hamasyan, shares a fantastic jazz composition off his latest Nonesuch longplayer "StandArt" and we bring the selection to an equally emotive close on a vintage recording by Japanese drummer Akira Ishikawa & Count Buffalos, originally released in 1971 and just recently reissued in time for Record Store Day.
As always, you can now stream the full selection on Spotify, which we hope you enjoy. And make sure you check out Loshh. Don't say we didn't tell you so.