DIRTMUSIC - Forced Exposure

$15.50 IN STOCK

"We need music like this to stay sane." --Murat Ertel

Dirtmusic return for their fifth album, a full-scale collaboration with Turkish-psych visionary Murat Ertel from Baba Zula. Recorded in Istanbul, the album navigates hypnotic rhythms, cinematic atmospheres and dark political realities. The striking figure of Murat Ertel is standing at the door of his home studio, a converted mechanic's garage in a suburb of Istanbul. The Turkish capital is a tense and conflicted place these days, but Baba Zula's leader and saz man is on fine form. Before him stand those current and former musical nomads, Chris Eckman and Hugo Race, guitars in hand. Dirtmusic are about to take on their latest, and perhaps most thrilling form. Originally a straight-talking, mainly acoustic trio mining blues and country for 21st century gold, the band's first happy accident was to stumble upon Tamikrest at the fabled Festival au Désert in Timbuktu in 2008. In the meantime, however, the Islamist takeover of Northern Mali in 2012 had darkened the sound and the songwriting, giving them a tone that continues to resonate through the new record. The opening track, "Bi De Sen Söyle", is a statement of intent, musically and lyrically: shared vocals that mass in urgent call-and-response, the psychedelic grip of Ertel's saz, which barely leaves the record for a second, and percussion from Ümit Adakale that tells you that this is music for clubs and parties as much as for private spaces. It shares this with "The Border Crossing", the prime slice of Pop Group-inflected postpunk-funk that follows it. It's a questing, restless record for the head, but perhaps more so for the body. It broods throughout, as post-punk, Turkish psych, funk, rock and electronics stalk the grooves with widescreen intent -- listen to 'Safety In Numbers', for example, an instant classic that sees Race in imperious form, or "Love Is A Foreign Country", which features a startling appearance by Gaye Su Akyol, a treat for those who loved her Hologram İmparatorluğu (GB 040CD/LP, 2016). Personnel: Hugo Race - vocals, guitars, bass, loops, programming; Chris Eckman - vocals, guitars, loops, kalimba; Murat Ertel - vocals, electric saz, divan saz, bağlama rhythm machine; Ümit Adakale - darbuka, davul, bendir, percussion. Also features Gaye Su Akyol, Brenna Mac Crimmon, and Görkem Şen.

$23.50 IN STOCK

LP version. 180 gram vinyl. Includes download code. "We need music like this to stay sane." --Murat Ertel

Dirtmusic return for their fifth album, a full-scale collaboration with Turkish-psych visionary Murat Ertel from Baba Zula. Recorded in Istanbul, the album navigates hypnotic rhythms, cinematic atmospheres and dark political realities. The striking figure of Murat Ertel is standing at the door of his home studio, a converted mechanic's garage in a suburb of Istanbul. The Turkish capital is a tense and conflicted place these days, but Baba Zula's leader and saz man is on fine form. Before him stand those current and former musical nomads, Chris Eckman and Hugo Race, guitars in hand. Dirtmusic are about to take on their latest, and perhaps most thrilling form. Originally a straight-talking, mainly acoustic trio mining blues and country for 21st century gold, the band's first happy accident was to stumble upon Tamikrest at the fabled Festival au Désert in Timbuktu in 2008. In the meantime, however, the Islamist takeover of Northern Mali in 2012 had darkened the sound and the songwriting, giving them a tone that continues to resonate through the new record. The opening track, "Bi De Sen Söyle", is a statement of intent, musically and lyrically: shared vocals that mass in urgent call-and-response, the psychedelic grip of Ertel's saz, which barely leaves the record for a second, and percussion from Ümit Adakale that tells you that this is music for clubs and parties as much as for private spaces. It shares this with "The Border Crossing", the prime slice of Pop Group-inflected postpunk-funk that follows it. It's a questing, restless record for the head, but perhaps more so for the body. It broods throughout, as post-punk, Turkish psych, funk, rock and electronics stalk the grooves with widescreen intent -- listen to 'Safety In Numbers', for example, an instant classic that sees Race in imperious form, or "Love Is A Foreign Country", which features a startling appearance by Gaye Su Akyol, a treat for those who loved her Hologram İmparatorluğu (GB 040CD/LP, 2016). Personnel: Hugo Race - vocals, guitars, bass, loops, programming; Chris Eckman - vocals, guitars, loops, kalimba; Murat Ertel - vocals, electric saz, divan saz, bağlama rhythm machine; Ümit Adakale - darbuka, davul, bendir, percussion. Also features Gaye Su Akyol, Brenna Mac Crimmon, and Görkem Şen.

$15.50 IN STOCK

2010 release. "BKO" is the international abbreviation for Bamako Airport in Mali's capital city. It is also the title of second album by Dirtmusic, a group of rock 'n' roll veterans from the USA and Australia, which was recorded at the famous Studio Bogolan in Bamako -- set up by the late Ali Farka Touré. All three members of Dirtmusic have a long-lasting history as musicians and songwriters in various bands: Chris Eckman is the leader of acclaimed US band The Walkabouts, and has also collaborated with Willard Grant Conspiracy and many others. Chris Brokaw has collaborated with Evan Dando and The Lemonheads, Liz Phair, and Thurston Moore. The two Americans are joined by Australian-born Hugo Race, the leader of True Spirit and one of the original members of The Bad Seeds. Eckman and Race were labelmates and in 2006 they got together with Brokaw to form Dirtmusic. Dirtmusic's first album, recorded in 2007 in Eckman's adopted home city of Ljubljana, Slovenia, somehow got into the hands of the booking agent for Mali's annual Festival of the Desert, who invited them to perform. Next to Dirtmusic's tent was that of young Touareg desert blues band Tamikrest. The two bands found themselves jamming together almost non-stop and discovered that their ideas and music fit perfectly. It was clear that this jam somehow had to continue after the festival. So a year later Dirtmusic returned to Mali to record BKO -- with Tamikrest backing them in the studio. During their meeting in the desert they had played The Velvet Underground's legendary "All Tomorrow's Parties" together. When Brokaw struck up the first few chords of the song, Tamikrest just jumped right in without a second thought, as if they'd been listening to The Velvet Underground since the '60s -- which they hadn't. Luckily, they recreated this jam in the studio to include on the album. The natural process continued throughout the recording. For instance, Tamikrest leader Ousmane Ag Mossa spontaneously sings in Tamashek over the groove to "Black Gravity" and a kind of fusion erupts between Dirtmusic and Tamikrest. (While most songs are composed by either Eckman, Race, or Brokaw, "Black Gravity" contains Ousmane's own composition "Imidiwan," meaning "friends," which he gave to his new friends of Dirtmusic to include inside their song "Black Gravity.") Other Malian stars paid visits to the studio: Fadimata Walet Oumar from the famous Touareg group Tartit lends her sublime vocals to "All Tomorrow's Parties" and "Desert Wind." Two master musicians from Toumani Diabaté's Symmetric Orchestra jam on several abstract pieces, with one of them, "Niger Sundown," included on the album, while guitar legend Lobi Traoré plays on closing track "Bring It Home." The CD comes with a bonus PAL-format, region-free DVD containing a documentary, three music videos, and four bonus songs.

$12.00 IN STOCK

Midline pricing. Dirtmusic's previous album Troubles (GB 005CD/LP) was recorded in Bamako, Mali in the dark days of the 2012 political upheaval. A propulsive collection of cinematic Afro-rock, Troubles for the most part rose out of improvisational sessions involving Hugo Race (Fatalists, Bad Seeds) and Chris Eckman (The Walkabouts) of Dirtmusic and the nimble, balafon-driven Ben Zabo band. Malian luminaries like Samba Touré, Zoumana Tereta, Aminata Wassidjé Traoré, and Virginie Dembelé from the Rokia Traore band, brought exhilarating vocal and instrumental contributions to the collective. Troubles was not a mere construct or hybrid, but rather something deeply collaborative and genre-busting. Louder Than War wrote: "an incisive and unique journey in sound... this album is rock, it's roll, its funk, it's African, it's an aural delight." Lion City, the new Dirtmusic album, is culled from the same Bamako sessions as Troubles but offers a decidedly different atmosphere and ambiance. While the Ben Zabo band is still the core collaborator, the textures and tempos are slower and more opaque. Organics and electronics intertwine and unfold unpredictably. There are less guitars and more liquid sounds. The outward frustration and fear documented on the previous album has given way to something more insular and pensive. The echoing space between the notes is emphasized and subsequently so are the voices and the texts. Samba Touré provides a vocal and lyric for "Red Dust," a song that enshrines the contemplative mood of the album. Over a swirling dubscape he intones: "How can we reconcile and forgive? How can we bring peace to those that hate us? Yet we have no choice. We need to stop fighting." While Samba Touré, Ben Zabo and his band, and Aminata Wassidjé Traoré previously appeared on Troubles, Lion City also features an inspired team of new collaborators: Tamikrest members Ousmane Ag Mossa (guitar), Cheikhe Ag Tiglia (bass) and Aghaly Ag Mohamedine (percussion) appear on the bluesy and meditative "Movin' Careful." This is the first time the two groups have collaborated since Dirtmusic's BKO album from 2010. The iconic Takamba band Super 11, from northern Mali, exchange thorn-like trance sounds with Hugo and Chris on the album's opening number "Stars of Gao." MC Jazz, an up and coming Bamako hip-hop artist adds a fiery incantation to the mostly instrumental "Day the Grid Went Down." Ibrahima Douf, a young singer from Senegal, provides a stunning vocal on the album's final track "September 12." The 21st century claims to be borderless. A world of hyper-communication and instant nostalgia that is both celebrated and feared. On Lion City Dirtmusic stayed clear of such theorizing and just got on with the practice. The collective joy they found in making this music is what mattered most.

$23.50 IN STOCK

LP version on 180 gram vinyl. Includes a CD copy of the album. Dirtmusic's previous album Troubles (GB 005CD/LP) was recorded in Bamako, Mali in the dark days of the 2012 political upheaval. A propulsive collection of cinematic Afro-rock, Troubles for the most part rose out of improvisational sessions involving Hugo Race (Fatalists, Bad Seeds) and Chris Eckman (The Walkabouts) of Dirtmusic and the nimble, balafon-driven Ben Zabo band. Malian luminaries like Samba Touré, Zoumana Tereta, Aminata Wassidjé Traoré, and Virginie Dembelé from the Rokia Traore band, brought exhilarating vocal and instrumental contributions to the collective. Troubles was not a mere construct or hybrid, but rather something deeply collaborative and genre-busting. Louder Than War wrote: "an incisive and unique journey in sound... this album is rock, it's roll, its funk, it's African, it's an aural delight." Lion City, the new Dirtmusic album, is culled from the same Bamako sessions as Troubles but offers a decidedly different atmosphere and ambiance. While the Ben Zabo band is still the core collaborator, the textures and tempos are slower and more opaque. Organics and electronics intertwine and unfold unpredictably. There are less guitars and more liquid sounds. The outward frustration and fear documented on the previous album has given way to something more insular and pensive. The echoing space between the notes is emphasized and subsequently so are the voices and the texts. Samba Touré provides a vocal and lyric for "Red Dust," a song that enshrines the contemplative mood of the album. Over a swirling dubscape he intones: "How can we reconcile and forgive? How can we bring peace to those that hate us? Yet we have no choice. We need to stop fighting." While Samba Touré, Ben Zabo and his band, and Aminata Wassidjé Traoré previously appeared on Troubles, Lion City also features an inspired team of new collaborators: Tamikrest members Ousmane Ag Mossa (guitar), Cheikhe Ag Tiglia (bass) and Aghaly Ag Mohamedine (percussion) appear on the bluesy and meditative "Movin' Careful." This is the first time the two groups have collaborated since Dirtmusic's BKO album from 2010. The iconic Takamba band Super 11, from northern Mali, exchange thorn-like trance sounds with Hugo and Chris on the album's opening number "Stars of Gao." MC Jazz, an up and coming Bamako hip-hop artist adds a fiery incantation to the mostly instrumental "Day the Grid Went Down." Ibrahima Douf, a young singer from Senegal, provides a stunning vocal on the album's final track "September 12." The 21st century claims to be borderless. A world of hyper-communication and instant nostalgia that is both celebrated and feared. On Lion City Dirtmusic stayed clear of such theorizing and just got on with the practice. The collective joy they found in making this music is what mattered most.

$34.50 IN STOCK

180 gram double LP version, housed in a deluxe gatefold sleeve with a CD of the album. Troubles is the new album from Dirtmusic -- Chris Eckman (The Walkabouts) and Hugo Race (Fatalists/True Spirit/Bad Seeds) -- recorded in Bamako, Mali, in September 2012 during the high-tension and tragic recent crisis -- hence the name. Originally a trio with Chris Brokaw (Come/Codeine), Dirtmusic released their eponymous debut in 2007, a gritty collection of acoustic ballads drawn from their American and Australian frontier roots. The band's explorations of raw, psych-folk-rock then took a radical detour out to the Saharan desert, to Timbuktu, performing at the legendary Festival-au-Desert. Dirtmusic's encounter at the Festival-au-Desert with the Tuareg band Tamikrest was the catalyst for the second album, BKO (2010), a classic, one-of-a-kind trip through the interzone between western and Tamasheq desert rock. The two bands toured Europe extensively and the album received major shout-outs from both the rock/pop and "world" music press. With the departure of Chris Brokaw, Race and Eckman decided to head further upriver, composing and recording an album from scratch in full collaboration with a select crew of Malian artists. Dirtmusic arrived in the Malian capital of Bamako with notebooks of lyrics, but without written songs or preconceived strategies. Drawing on musicians from the Ben Zabo and Samba Touré bands as a core rhythm section, Race and Eckman produced the sessions on the dancefloor of Salif Keita's Moffou Club, inviting in guest vocalists including not only Ben Zabo and Samba Touré, but also Virginie Dembele (from the Rokia Traoré ensemble), rising star Aminata Wassidje Traoré and soku-master Zoumana Tereta. There are many voices telling stories on Troubles, singing in Songhai, Bambara, Tamasheq, and English, stories of war and peace and love and doubt in the shadow of an oncoming storm, and like a musical version of cinema verité, everything is real, in-the-moment and utterly direct. Inspired by the collision between West African rhythms, digital sorcery and rock'n'roll, Troubles is a singular and border-slicing musical journey.

$12.00 IN STOCK

Midline pricing. Troubles is the new album from Dirtmusic -- Chris Eckman (The Walkabouts) and Hugo Race (Fatalists/True Spirit/Bad Seeds) -- recorded in Bamako, Mali, in September 2012 during the high-tension and tragic recent crisis -- hence the name. Originally a trio with Chris Brokaw (Come/Codeine), Dirtmusic released their eponymous debut in 2007, a gritty collection of acoustic ballads drawn from their American and Australian frontier roots. The band's explorations of raw, psych-folk-rock then took a radical detour out to the Saharan desert, to Timbuktu, performing at the legendary Festival-au-Desert. Dirtmusic's encounter at the Festival-au-Desert with the Tuareg band Tamikrest was the catalyst for the second album, BKO (2010), a classic, one-of-a-kind trip through the interzone between western and Tamasheq desert rock. The two bands toured Europe extensively and the album received major shout-outs from both the rock/pop and "world" music press. With the departure of Chris Brokaw, Race and Eckman decided to head further upriver, composing and recording an album from scratch in full collaboration with a select crew of Malian artists. Dirtmusic arrived in the Malian capital of Bamako with notebooks of lyrics, but without written songs or preconceived strategies. Drawing on musicians from the Ben Zabo and Samba Touré bands as a core rhythm section, Race and Eckman produced the sessions on the dancefloor of Salif Keita's Moffou Club, inviting in guest vocalists including not only Ben Zabo and Samba Touré, but also Virginie Dembele (from the Rokia Traoré ensemble), rising star Aminata Wassidje Traoré and soku-master Zoumana Tereta. There are many voices telling stories on Troubles, singing in Songhai, Bambara, Tamasheq, and English, stories of war and peace and love and doubt in the shadow of an oncoming storm, and like a musical version of cinema verité, everything is real, in-the-moment and utterly direct. Inspired by the collision between West African rhythms, digital sorcery and rock'n'roll, Troubles is a singular and border-slicing musical journey. And Troubles is only the first release from the sessions, with a second volume in the pipeline for a release on Glitterbeat in early 2014.