Tiki Tropical!

Former Concretes' frontwoman Victoria Bergsman released her third album last month as Taken By Trees. Following the excellent Eden LP which Bergsman recorded in Pakistan she's now been to Hawaii to record the follow-up Other Worlds. I love the whole Hawaiian sound of steel guitars and tropical beats mixed with Bergsman's soft laid back vocal style. Produced by Henning Fürst this album is the perfect accompaniment to to the summer, so listening to this in the cold autumn months soon warms you up inside deeming of hotter climates.

Intro song Horizon starts with the sound of the sea while coconut shells clip clop out the beat and the first sounds of Hawaiian steel guitars subtly twang in the background. Highest High drifts with ease and grace, filling your head with beautiful sounds of tiki wooden percussion, whirring guitars and Augustus Pablo-esque melodica. Dreams sets off into a faster pace with balearic beats and more luscious steel guitars.

Pacific Blue adds to the tropical mood with ocean-breeze steel pans and a easy going carnival beat. Only You sounds like a lost Cure song re-imagined by Bergman. Large ups the pace once more for a skanking ska beat with horn section and intricate percussion giving us a calypso flavour. Dub reggae tune Indigo dub is pure horizontal relaxation and blends nicely into reggae tinged I Want You. The album finishes with Dreams (Coconut Cut) bringing the sound back to where it started laying in a hammock on the beach sipping on a planters punch. Wonderful. Highly Recommended.

Buy it on iTunes here.

Tropicália folk

This catchy little tune from Está Vivo is making some waves online. African Run sounds like a cross between Devendra Banhart and Caetano Veloso with a voice like Frank Zappa. A free-spirited folk tune with a tropical edge, a simple riff with an infectious beat. Ryan McMahon previously toured with a band known as Bearries out of Chicago playing live electronica opening up for acts such as Justice and Telle. Following the demise of that short lived touring band in 2010 McMahon now makes his own solo music under the name Está Vivo. Check out his bandcamp and MySpace pages for some more great tunes.

Check out the Bandcamp page, A bands place in MySpace

Tropicália legend Caetano Veloso (Caetano Emanuel Viana Teles Veloso) has made some outstanding music and is most known for his participation in the Brazilian musical movement Tropicalismo which encompassed theatre, poetry and music in the 1960s, at the beginning of the Brazilian military dictatorship. Tropicália came from a Hélio Oiticica art installation of the same name.

This, the signature tune from the Tropicalismo movement is still fresh and relevant today as it was in 1968. Taken from Caetano Veloso's second self titled album. Also well worth checking out the the album that started it all Tropicália: ou Panis et Circenses, a collaboration by artists including Gilberto Gil, Caetano Veloso, Tom Zé, Nara Leão, Os Mutantes and Gal Costa and features arrangements by Rogerio Duprat.

It's good to hear some new music from Beirut, sounding on good form on this cover of the Tropicália legend Caetano Veloso.

The first track from the Red Hot Organization’s sequel to their 1996 comp Red Hot + Rio, paying homage to Brazilian Tropicália. The album will also feature Dirty Projectors, of Montreal, St. Vincent, Neon Indian, Beck, Devendra Banhart, Madlib, José González, and John Legend. Quite the eclectic mix, Can't wait!

Find out the full lo-down on redhot.org