neo-soul

  • Sometimes, it feels like all it takes is a blink to miss something important. I say this because just weeks ago, on Dec. 30, in between major holidays, news trickled out of the untimely death of a Japanese enka giant. It was Aki Yashiro – that mainstay of all sake-loving drinkers – who succumbed to…

  • Some of you might not realize it but It appears that lately I’ve been exploring a bit of musical nostalgia. For me, it’s that sweet spot in the mid ‘90s when the rise of a harder form of rap music sort of “disrupted” the whole music industry, causing it to further gentrify itself, compartmentalizing whole…

  • If it’s comfort week for me, it’s more music comfort for y’all. And it doesn’t get any more comfortable than Yasuko Agawa’s (aka Miss A) Dancing Lovers’ Nite. On the surface, far from being the jazzy/soulful Japanese pop music she’s much more known for, somewhere, lay something hidden: a fascinating, heart-pumping stab at taking her…

  • Subliminal Calm

    Whenever I put on Subliminal Calm’s first and only release I immediately think of spring. Featuring a sublime mix of country, dub, folk and soul music, Subliminal Calm could only have been created by the inspirational minds behind it. Appropriately titled, there’s something quite delicate and beautiful in this set of music from minds that…

  • Paul Buchanan from The Blue Nile I’m a firm believer in art seen through movements. Although movements might have disparate artists within them, they tend to share a certain philosophy. There was something genuinely different that was brewing underneath Britain in the late ’80s. In music especially so, maybe as a reaction to all the…

  • Subconsciously, throughout this whole month there was an album and specifically an artist I was reminiscing about all through it. Something, about September reminds me about her. For me, September has always been one of my favorite months. I never can pinpoint why exactly. It could be that the environment reminds me of certain things…

  • Teena Marie My track of the day by Teena Marie was long overdue some examination. Supremely underrated in her time, except by black audiences, and still completely underrated in the grand scope of music. This California born white girl stunned most who heard her the first time by having a voice belying her background and…

ambient art pop art rock balearic brazilian electro-acoustic england environmental music experimental fourth world Funk fusion japan jazz minimalist mpb neo-folk neoclassical new age walearic