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Reviews

Review of Like Nightingales in the Spring

Like Nightingales in the Spring

Orkestra Shkodra

Top of the World

ODA 3

Rating: ★★★★★

The north Albanian town of Shkodër, lying between lake and mountains, embraces multiple cultures and histories. While it was still...

Reviewed by Kim Burton in issue: March/2023

Review of Tango Mediterraneo

Tango Mediterraneo

Paolo Karim

Paolo Karim

Rating: ★

Paolo Karim Gozzo, a singer-songwriter with Sicilian and Moroccan origins, appeared on the Italian X Factor franchise in 2009. He...

Reviewed by Chris Moss in issue: March/2023

Review of Water of Life

Water of Life

Maajo

Wonderwheel Recordings

Rating: ★★★

Water of Life is the third album from Afro-Finnish collective Maajo, a group who have built a reputation for melding...

Reviewed by Alex De Lacey in issue: March/2023

Review of Fâ

Togo All Stars

Excelsior

Rating: ★★★

Togo's musical culture combines the chants and beats of vodoun with influences drawn from its larger neighbours – Benin and...

Reviewed by Nigel Williamson in issue: March/2023

Review of Estrellas

Estrellas

Guts

Top of the World

Heavenly Sweetness

Rating: ★★★★★

This is a glorious album that was never supposed to happen. Fabrice Henri, the French hip-hop producer better known as...

Reviewed by Robin Denselow in issue: March/2023

Review of Lady Sings the Balkan Blues

Lady Sings the Balkan Blues

Mostar Sevdah Reunion

Top of the World

Snail Records

Rating: ★★★★

Mostar Sevdah Reunion are a Bosnian institution. Emerging out of the ruins of war-torn Bosnia in 1998, tending the traditions...

Reviewed by Robert Rigney in issue: March/2023

Review of Let Me Out

Let Me Out

Balaklava Blues

Unfit Records

Rating: ★★★

War is not always amenable to great art. Feelings of horror, loss and grief give rise to a sense that...

Reviewed by Robert Rigney in issue: March/2023

Review of All of This Is Chance

All of This Is Chance

Lisa O’Neill

Top of the World

Rough Trade Records

Rating: ★★★★★

Fresh from signing off Peaky Blinders with a cover of Bob Dylan's ‘All the Tired Horses’, O’Neill returns to her...

Reviewed by Michael Quinn in issue: March/2023

Review of Sweet Tooth

Sweet Tooth

Mali Obomsawin

Out of Your Head Records

Rating: ★★★★

Here's a heady blend of ancestral Native American and Canadian First Nations culture and the emotive energy of contemporary free...

Reviewed by Jeff Kaliss in issue: March/2023

Review of Ahol az Ökör is Bort Iszik!

Ahol az Ökör is Bort Iszik!

Magos | Magos & Limón

Fonó

Rating: ★★★★

Magos are a fine Hungarian folk band playing authentic village music, mostly from Romanian Transylvania. They and their violinist Csaba...

Reviewed by Simon Broughton in issue: March/2023

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