Terakaft - Akh Issudar (2008)

Terakaft are a group of Touareg nomadic guitarists who have become increasingly prominent in the world music scene in the last few years. On Akh Issudar, their first major release, they've amalgamated Saharan nomad music with blues and a tinge of psychedelic rock. The result isn't at all complex but they're all the better for it.

With three guitarists (all of whom sing) and no percussion, you'd expect their sound to be an uncomplicated one and it is. But they put so much intensity into those sparse notes and they can easily turn down the burning passion for more trance-inducing cuts. They have a distinct meandering quality to their music which is not unlike their lifestyle.

Since it's their first wide release, Akh Issudar is as good a starting point as any for venturing into desert blues.

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Sun City Girls - "Funeral Mariachi" (2010)

The final studio album from Sun City Girls. For those not familiar with the band, the Girls formed by brothers Alan and Richard Bishop in 1979 in Phoenix, Arizona, who formally disbanded in 2007 after the untimely death of drummer Charles Gocher. During their nearly three decades together they released a dizzying array of some of the most unique and challenging experimental music to come out of America. Combining influences ranging from surf rock, punk, movie soundtracks, freejaz, traditional Middle Eastern and African music, spoken word, and free improv (as well as having borderline performance art live shows) the group may seem absolutely impenetrable from the outset, especially if you don't know where to start.

Well, "Funeral Mariachi" is a pretty good place to begin. While most SCG albums are seemingly entirely idiosyncratic and chock-full of unpredictable weirdness, this album has probably the most coherent number of actual "songs" in their catalogue, while still remaining unmistakably Sun City Girls. This is very obvious from the first few moments of the opening track "Ben's Radio" which eventually gives way to a spaghetti western vibe which is densely prominent throughout the majority of the album. There is heavy Ennio Morricone influence here, especially in the second half of the album (including a cover of Morricone's "Come Maddelena"). The standout track for me is "The Imam" combining Middle Eastern instrumentation and chanting with SCG flair (I swear I hear a rubber ducky as part of the percussion). While tracks like "Black Orchid" and "Blue West" are straight out of 60s Italian Westerns.

"Funeral Mariachi" is a wonderful final record to one of the most mysterious, engaging, and challenging bands of the 20th century.

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Arcn Templ - Emanations of a New World (2010)

Singapore based musicians Leslie Low and Vivian Wang, both from the obscure rock band, The Observatory, step from that project to form the strange Arcn Templ. They set to project a totally wild atmosphere, building a very naturalistic, world music like sound, with a spacey ambiance.

Certainly one of the most surprising albums I've come across this year, they harken back to some of the older experimentalists, names such as Igor Wakhevitch or Klaus Schulze. But even they didn't really bother too much with the kind of intertwining folk with their primarily spacey ambient music.

Kind of a sparse post, but I just want to get something up here. Plus, it's a fantastically simple album, in terms of it's general sound. I could certainly go through, listing different movements, and the sort of theoretical placement of them, but I think there is such a primal reaction to this. To go through and pick at every chord, every measure, it would ruin what is going on. I think I'll spare this release the trouble.

Buy (There are plenty of places to buy this, even Amazon, if you so choose. Forced Exposure happens to be a personal favorite, though)

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