Past Programs
RandB - 2008
CD of the Week - Taj Mahal
17/11/2008
40 years as a significant figure in the diverse worlds of blues, soul, reggae and world music is no mean feat, and rather than just compiling a greatest hits retrospective, Taj Mahal has celebrated this milestone by putting out a brand new album Maestro.
In keeping with recent trends, he has decided to include many tracks which are collaborations, and so has joined up with a very fine list of well-known acts for this record, including Ben Harper, Jack Johnson, Toumani Diabate, Angelique Kidjo, Los Lobos and Ziggy Marley. As you’d expect, the result is a CD which covers everything from hard-edged blues through reggae and soul to West African sounds.
Irma Thomas (First Broadcast on 8/5/2006)
25/09/2008
Irma Thomas’ new CD After The Rain showcases her wonderfully warm New Orleans soul voice in a new way, with great songs and sympathetic, mostly acoustic backing.
Reported missing during Katrina, she was actually playing a gig in Austin Texas at the time and returned home to find her house flooded. Even though the songs for After The Rain were chosen before Katrina, they resonate eerily with the disaster. It’s the first CD in 6 years for the singer who has been recording for 46 years and is known for having hits on Time is on My Side and Ruler of My Heart. Producer Scott Billington said that ‘Irma has one of the richest and most beautiful voices in contemporary music. It seemed confining at this stage of her career to make a straight R&B record, so we broke the mold.’ Irma is joined by some great players - Sonny Landreth, Corey Harris and Dirk Powell among them.
Two-Faced Friday
25/04/2008
Listening back over the last week, and forward to what’s on The Daily Planet next week.
Bakelite Radio
24/04/2008
On his new CD, Bakelite Radio Vol. IV, Joe Camilleri, the chameleonic master of beautifully produced roots music, takes on the colours of New Orleans R&B, with a couple of Allan Toussaint and Dr. John numbers each and some Camilleri/Nick Smith originals.
The tenor sax is king with Joe and Wilbur Wilde sharing the crown, with Joe Creighton taking up the bass roles as the band steers away from country and towards soul with a touch of rock and roll. Joe is so good at such a large range of roots music and records it so tastefully and prolifically that we’re in danger of taking the Melbourne hipster-entrepreneur empire that he’s created for granted.
Hot 8 Brass Band
01/04/2008
In the tough neighbourhoods of New Orleans, there is often an anachronistic mix of marching brass bands and the latest R&B and Hip Hop sounds. The Hot 8 Brass Band meld these two styles together into a shambolic celebration.
This group, that plays in second line parades every Sunday hosted by a ‘Social Aid and Pleasure Club’ and in traditional jazz funeral processions, also do a version of Marvin Gaye’s Sexual Healing and incorporate rapping on their CD Rock With the Hot 8 Brass Band. The band’s profile was lifted by an appearance in Spike Lee’s 2006 Katrina documentary When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts. They have also made the news due to tragic circumstances - the violent shooting deaths of three of their members within a 10-year time span. After the 2006 murder of Hot 8 singer/percussionist Dinerral Shavers, the group www.silenceisviolence.org was founded to address the persistent problem of violent crime in New Orleans.
