Ramuntcho Matta

My, what a curious album this is. If you struggle to determine an overriding aesthetic, that's maybe half the point. If, say, it's world music, it's the world of everyday urban life. ‘Eau’, for example, sounds like it was recorded inside a sewage pumping station, while ‘Avatar’ resembles a scene from an insalubrious kitchen in which a blocked sink gurgles while a dog barks incessantly outside – redolent perhaps of the Manhattan apartment this French producer, son of the celebrated painter Roberto Matta, once shared with Brazilian legends Naná Vasconcelos and Arto Lindsay (in the same building as Talking Heads’ Tina Weymouth and Chris Frantz).

The album might have suited the ultra-trendy ZE Records, but was released only in France in 1985 – to sink without trace and acquire semi-legendary status. Conceived as the soundtrack for choreographer Régine Chopinot's play VIA, with costumes by Jean-Paul Gaultier, DIY no-wave tracks like ‘Gesti’, with its opening solo guitar musings, were recorded at home, while group tracks like the three mesmerising ambient soundscapes entitled ‘Zoique 3’ were produced in a Paris studio. If you like Jon Hassell, Eno and/or David Byrne, try this one. My Life in the Bush of Ghosts it ain't, but there's plenty to enjoy.