Whether you agree with it or not, the whole world associates Reggae, Ska, Dub, whatever it shall be named with the country of Jamaica more than any other region.
Of course I agree with this, but my point is that the whole tapestry of Jamaican music is too broad a church to be tacked to the ‘regional’ genre, and only ended up that way because of the OP. It goes back to my age-old argument of many people basing their opinion of Jamaican music on the output of Bob Marley from 1971 onwards. Marley’s Island albums have always been closer to AOR to me, and take away the subject matter they could easily pass as such. They are not ‘regional’ music, having been tailored specifically for a Western audience. Ironically Heart Of The Congos is the antithesis, albeit still falling under the same genre.
Take your point about the influence of US Rhythm and Blues in other genres, and agree that Kuti’s work for example is as rooted in Western stylings as anything that came out of Nigeria before it (especially given his link-up with Ginger Baker). High-Life the same.
I guess I’m a bit of a purist and thought the original plan of having ‘Caribbean’ music (including Calypso, Mento, Soca and the like as well as albums from JA) would have been a much better idea. As it is the decision was made to lump it in with music from 90% of the rest of the world, so a work like HotC ends up ‘competing’ with indigenous music from Asia, sub-Saharan Africa or wherever. The only Congos-related LP I wanted to see in a regional thread was this:
Whether you agree with it or not, the whole world associates Reggae, Ska, Dub, whatever it shall be named with the country of Jamaica more than any other region.
Of course I agree with this, but my point is that the whole tapestry of Jamaican music is too broad a church to be tacked to the ‘regional’ genre. It goes back to my age-old argument of many people basing their opinion of Jamaican music on the output of Bob Marley from 1971 onwards. Marley’s Island albums have always been closer to AOR to me, and take away the subject matter they could easily pass as such. They are not ‘regional’ music, having been tailored specifically for a Western audience. Ironically Heart Of The Congos is the antithesis, albeit still falling under the same genre.
Take your point about the influence of US Rhythm and Blues in other genres, and agree that Kuti’s work for example is as rooted in Western stylings as anything that came out of Nigeria before it (especially given his link-up with Ginger Baker). High-Life the same.
I guess I’m a bit of a purist and thought the original plan of having ‘Caribbean’ music (including Calypso, Mento, Soca and the like as well as albums from JA) would have been a much better idea. As it is the decision was made to lump it in with music from 90% of the rest of the world, so a work like HotC ends up ‘competing’ with indigenous music from Asia, sub-Saharan Africa or wherever. The only Congos-related LP I wanted to see was this:
I understand you better now, and I agree with the statement in bold. It sounds like the same troubles I have with other music from the same area. There is a boatload of Cuban, Puerto Rican, and other island's musical styles of Mambo, ChaChaCha, Merengue, etc. that is never categorized correctly or for the right place. I've been trying to put some of it on the site, but I can never find enough information on where they are actually from sometimes. Like this band is led by a guy from Puerto Rico, but this song is the "Cuban Cha Cha Cha" and at least one of the other members it from New York. It's all a mess really, as to what "region" this should belong to.
I’ve been keeping an eye on events here after saying I wouldn’t participate, but I can’t let some of the trash I’ve been reading go without being addressed.
Nothing I wrote was wrong except calling Heart of the Congos dub. Calling my posts “trash” is a little rude, even if something in them was wrong. I thought it was dub because of all of the Perry studio effects on it, not just because of the bass.
I never claimed to know a lot about reggae. In my first post about the album, the first thing I said was “don’t know how experienced I am,” meaning I wasn’t all that experienced. I wouldn’t have replied to sethmadsen’s post if I thought someone else who was more knowledgeable about reggae was going to answer. It seemed like only one member who was really knowledgeable about reggae participated in the thread and the odds of him replying about one particular album didn't seem that high. Since I (along with baystateoftheart) was the one who got it into the top 10, I felt a little responsibility to try to explain why I liked it so much.
Source for my statement about Jamaica’s economy and dub:
Mojo Magazine wrote:
Jamaica’s failing economy in the ’70s meant recycling was a part of every day life, so it followed that, with studio time and recording tape expensive, producers like Lee Perry and King Tubby began taking old backing tracks and remixing them into sonically crackpot but undeniably brilliant ‘dubs’.
Your initial post is self-defeating because in the first part you’re condescending and the second part you discuss why you think the album's great, but after your condescension, why would I (and maybe others) be interested in your opinion? If you want to encourage people to delve deeper into reggae you really couldn't have gone about it in a worse way.
Thank you Jimmy and PurpleHazel and Chief for your input. I suppose a dogmatic approach to something like genre and like RichardSauce said, your just going to piss someone off. I'm glad a forum like this allows for all users to state their experiences and share and learn.
I totally thought it was a female voice, but after listening again, it totally is a falsetto/high tenor, thanks for clarifying. It's like when I mishear lyrics for 10 years and then someone corrects me or I finally read them for the first time.
By the way -this whole regional thing started out as - hey let's discuss all the popular music parent genres at a high level. Originally each area was going to have their own thread as dictated by Wikipedia (Asia, Caribbean, Africa, Latin, etc.) and then it was suggested to use RYM's genre map instead of Wikipedia's... and well there is no reggae there as a parent genre, and there's not even African music. The parent genre is called regional music and that's more or less what started this thread. The classification from RYM goes like this:
Regional Music>Caribbean Music>Jamaican Music>Reggae (as a 3rd subgenre)
Been listening to this tonight - it's so mesmerizing - it's like a hurdy gurdy drone and a dulcimer gone to another dimension.
Anybody know stuff about this - is he adjusting the tuning to switch notes or is that part of how that instrument is played (when it goes really low)? (about 2:40 to 3:20 of Raga Jog).
Also what I like about it is the quality that it almost is being played backwards and forwards at the same time - nearly transcending time (which is incredibly important to music... space and time and all).
This is a grower for sure. My first time listening to it, I thought I liked other "Latin" music better... this is probably my 5th listen and the swing and style is fantastic. Mood is everything.
I want to smoke a cigar, drive a beat up chevy from the 50s with no air conditioning and sweat like crazy on my way to the beach to just listen to this on the way, and then dance at sunset to it on the beach.
Much of the top artists represented here are taking a western approach to "Arabic" music (as stated in the bio, etc.) - which I suppose in of itself is just fine. As someone wanting to try and understand a true source of "Arabic" music, it probably isn't the horses mouth... any "horses mouth" artists anyone is familiar with? Maybe just dig a little deeper on the chart?
Much of the top artists represented here are taking a western approach to "Arabic" music (as stated in the bio, etc.) - which I suppose in of itself is just fine. As someone wanting to try and understand a true source of "Arabic" music, it probably isn't the horses mouth... any "horses mouth" artists anyone is familiar with? Maybe just dig a little deeper on the chart?
Anouar Brahem's aight, I've just never fallen in love with his stuff. Give Hamza El Din a chance, he's a staple. Ali Hassan Kuban, Rabih Abou-Khalil and Fairuz are all worth checking out too. Maybe give Maleem Mahmoud Ghania's record from last year a spin, it was long, but really solid. Great restaurant music. If you can find any street music from Istanbul, that'd also be a rec.
Much of the top artists represented here are taking a western approach to "Arabic" music (as stated in the bio, etc.) - which I suppose in of itself is just fine. As someone wanting to try and understand a true source of "Arabic" music, it probably isn't the horses mouth... any "horses mouth" artists anyone is familiar with? Maybe just dig a little deeper on the chart?
Maybe they fall in the category of " too Western", but those Natacha Atlas albums I picked are listed in the chart you posted from rateyourmusic. She placed three albums in the top 50 of that list and Five in the top 100. And the genre tag they gave her is "Arabic Pop". So I guess it's proper to call it Arabic music. Maybe some people would object to the modern production techniques on them if they were looking for something more rootsy or something. But I can't think of any other Arabic music I'm familiar with to recommend something else to you. But that was a really good list you posted. It will be a good place for me to start. I had no idea there was so much Arabic jazz in the world. Sounds great.
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