Bonobo - Not just a horny primate

Ninja Tune DJ Bonobo's latest album is a solid trip-hop effort. Two of the tracks are absolutely fantastic: All In Forms and Animals. Even if you don't think this is your type of music, give the songs a listen at least once all the way through. Bonobo builds a mood and uses dynamic beat changes and instrumentation to pack an emotional punch. In particular, these songs remind me of Cinematic Orchestra.

Check 'em out. If you like these two, his best all-time track is Between the Lines (featuring Bajka). Freakin' jazz flute man. Always a plus.

As always, if you like the songs, pay the man, Shirley.

From the Vault: Morphine - Cure for Pain

From time to time, I'll take a break from highlighting new music to unearth a hidden gem many people may not be familiar with. In particular, I'll try to find albums or artists that stand up to the test of time.

Morphine was a Boston-based minimalist Jazz/Blues/Rock outfit. They featured just drums, bass and sax. Their sound is unique and unlike any other band that I've heard before or since. The music on Cure for Pain, their 1993 masterpiece, is deep and lush; Dana Colley's baritone sax is lower than you're used to and Mark Sandman's voice and two-string slide bass playing both thrum on subdued frequencies. Just as the Allman Brothers are known for their signature dual guitar licks, Colley and Sandman would often duck and dive around each other, roughly following the same melody. On several songs, Morphine thickened the sound with Colley playing double sax or Sandman adding an organ, piano, tritar (three-string guitar), dobro, or found sounds of various sorts.

Every single song on this album is strong. Each one has a fat groove and, like the Violent Femmes, after a few listens, you can sing along word for word. Lastly, I'm not a lyrics guy, as most people who've heard me talk about music know, but Morphine had great lyrics.

Unfortunately, the whole album isn't on Lala, and I do strongly recommend this album over their other material. So check out the tracks on iTunes or Amazon or Last or Pandora or YouTube or something, but listen to this album. You won't be sorry.

Cat Empire Live in NYC!!!

Loving a band that hails from Australia ain't easy. On the plus side, they can rhyme Karma with Armor, which an American band can't get away with. After being a huge fan of these guys for a couple years now, I finally had the opportunity to see them on this North American Tour, but NYC was the closest they came to DC, so I made the trip up. I convinced Alex and Jon to go with me. The venue is right in Times Square, which is pretty amazing on a Saturday night. It's not much bigger than 9:30 in terms of the floor, but then they have a huge back area with seats. I'm not good at estimating seats, but I'd guess a couple thousand were packed in there. It was sold out. Oddly, they ran out of room in the coat checks, which just seems like bad planning for a venue in Northeast after all.

The show took a little while to get going, but around the fourth or fifth song, they did a Middle Eastern flavored song called The Darkness, where they just killed it for what seemed like ten minutes. After that, each song was better than the last, and the sweaty intensity of the show just went through the roof. Even though they don't have a guitarist, they make up for it in terms of rhythm with a DJ scratching around and one of their lead vocalists plays percussion. As for solos, the keyboardist is pretty damn good, but their trumpet players are outta sight. The lead trumpet also sings lead vocals and he blazed on both.

In terms of comparisons, they most reminded my of Ozomatli in terms of their sound and their live show experience. There was a lot of jumping up and down, hand waving, clapping and singing along. The energy was fantastic and no one wanted the show to end. It was good times.

If you're into latin jazzy, reggae, hip-hop influenced, high energy jam band-ish music, definitely check out the Cat Empire. Two Shoes is the albums to start with.