Music » World Dance Music

While not as out-of-left-field revelatory and astonishing as their exalted debut, nor as darkly magnetic as their sophomore follow-up, Volume 3: Further in Time finds Afro Celt Sound System fleshed out, funky, and fiercely fresh. Now a band of 20-some-odd players, the Afro Celts push forward with unbounded energy and focus, organically driven beats, and a thoroughly joyous fusion of West African and Irish traditional music enhanced with dissonant Eastern influence, psychedelic trip-hop groove, and a monster flood of sonic waves. The resultant sound is somehow both cutting-edge futuristic and primitive in its visceral virility. Demba Barry steps up with an unexpectedly punchy African hip-hop-styled vocal on "Shadowman," "Lagan" plays out into an orchestral swan dive, and, throughout, Johnny Kalsi and Moussa Sissokho come on like gangbusters with the drums. Real World label honcho and world-music champion Peter Gabriel does a stunning turn on the eminently catchy "When You're Falling," and Robert Plant contributes a powerfully epic rock vocal on "Life Begins Again." Fine as all these moments are, the centerpiece of volume 3, where the band achieves beyond perfect synthesis, is the ecstatic groove-lock on the African acid ceilidh of "Colossus." Volume 3 is the tune-in turn-on we've been waiting for. --Paige La Grone

Release Date: 2003-08-26, Audio CD, Karuna

This recording is one of the most beautiful documents of the Persian classical music. It is a musical dialogue between two undisputed masters and is a reflection of life during turbulent times in Iran, expressed forcefully and most delicately. This release has been digitally restored and newly re-mastered from the original recordings. Shajarian's singing is technically flawless, powerful, and strongly emotional. Lotfi is among the major figures who, in the past twenty years, have revolutionized the music of Iran. His original creativity and the deep-rooted emotional quality of this playing have made him the father of a new aesthetics in music of Iran.

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In the spirit of Mother Earth, Cybertribe leads the listener on a journey into the heartland with the haunting and musical sounds of didgeridoo, ambient vocal chants, and contemporary dance rhythms. The new version includes three new bonus tracks.

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Ronan Hardiman first gained renown as the composer for Michael Flatley's Irish dance extravaganzas, Lord of the Dance and Feet of Flames. On Anthem, his second solo release, he moves away from the relentlessly rhythmic music of his Flatley collaborations, in favor of a looser, more atmospheric style of composing and performing. Hardiman's sweeping synthesizer tones on tracks such as "Ready for Life" recall the ethereal music of Enya while his use of Latin chants on "Salve" sound like a less spooky version of Enigma. Hardiman has a gift for writing great hooks, which give songs like "That Place in Your Heart" and "Heaven (Waiting for Me There)" an unexpected, but enjoyable pop sheen. The songs on Anthem are not explicitly Irish, but Hardiman's strong melodic sense and mystical leanings imbue them with an irresistible Celtic character. --Michael Simmons

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AFRO CELT SOUND SYSTEM-AFRO CELT SOUND SYSTEM, VOL2: RELEASE

Ricardo Lemvo has added a new touch to rumba music over the years, mixing Cuban and West African sounds. Born in Kinshasa, the capital of Zaire, Lemvo started out by playing in bands that covered American R&B, learning his English phonetically from the song lyrics. But he heard the rumba incessantly on the radio, and also in his cousin's large record collection. After moving to Los Angeles and paying his dues in the music scene, he formed his own group, Makina Loca (a deliberate misspelling of maquina loca, Spanish for crazy machine) On Ay Valeria, Ricardo and friends serve up fiery salsa with explosive African Soukous guitars.