News

Balkan Beat Box Euro Tour, animation video and remixes

Balkan Beat Box Euro Tour, animation video and remixes

BBB are playing 13 shows in Europe to present "Blue Eyed Black Boy".


Balkan Beat Box - "War Again" from Crammed Discs on Vimeo.



Kicking off in Paris (13/4), London (14/4), Lille (15/4), Brussels (16/4); and moving on to Caen, Hamburg, Berlin, Amsterdam,  Munich. Cologne, Nancy, Bertignolles and Vienna. See more details in the "live" section of the site.

Come join the party!

The animation video for "War Again", the first single off the album,was directed by Paul Griswold, and is being aired on various TV channels including MTV Germany.

Several remixes are filtering through, by the likes RJD2, Radioclit, Brazilian Girls and more to be announced

Limited vinyl editions of the Cibelle & Lonely Drifter Karen albums

Limited vinyl editions of the Cibelle & Lonely Drifter Karen albums

Pre-order now and get a free download of the entire album
Pre-order the limited-edition VINYL version of "Fall of Spring" by Lonely Drifter Karen,
and immediately get a free download of the entire album (including the digital-only bonus track "Seasonal Things" feat. Dana Janssen from Akron/Family) !

Pre-order the limited-edition VINYL version of "Las Vênus Resort Palace Hotel" by Cibelle,
and immediately get a free download of the entire album (plus some surprise goodie) !

The Lonely Drifter Karen album is a single vinyl LP including a poster,  the Cibelle album is a double-LP in a gatefold sleeve, including a poster.

To order the Lonely Drifter Karen album on vinyl, CLICK HERE   
 
To order the Cibelle album on vinyl: CLICK HERE







Konono track premiered on Rolling Stone, Wire cover story

Konono track premiered on Rolling Stone, Wire cover story


"Wumbanzanga", a first (12-minute) track off Konono N°1's new album Assume Crash Position, was premiered this week on RollingStone.com.

Meanwhile, to illustrate their excellent, 8-page cover story on Konono No.1 and Kasai Allstars, Wire magazine have posted an exclusive live video of Konono performing live at the Saint Nazaire festival in France. This is an excerpt of a 52 minute film on Konono shot and directed by French filmmaker Jacques Goldstein during that festival.

The video is here

Megafaun in Europe... The Sequel!

Megafaun in Europe... The Sequel!

Megafaun return to European shores in triumph this March!




If you didn't see them last time round (their debut EU tour was late last year), you missed a banjo-wielding, noise-embracing, good-times-bringing jamboree that often saw the band ending up in the middle of the crowd ... here's your chance to join the fun!  

To celebrate, they are releasing a new digital single of "Kaufman's Ballad" (as taken from the band's masterful Gather, Form & Fly" album), backed with "Wreck On The Highway", a cover of a dark song with a troubled story: credited for years to country music pioneer Roy Acuff (who recorded it in 1942), it was actually written by an obscure millworker and musician named Dorsey Dixon, who had to struggle for years to gain back his rights.

A charming little film on the making of Lonely Drifter Karen's new album

A charming little film on the making of Lonely Drifter Karen's new album

The "Fall of Spring" album is a work of beautiful light and shade, of seasonal drifts and colourful contrasts...
...with the band's already broad musical palette enriched by brass/woodwind arrangements, tremolo-soaked electric guitars, pedal steel, inventive percussive textures and a thrilling new-found taste for rocking out!

Guests on the album include Emily Jane White (who duets on the track Seeds), Dana Janssen from Akron/Family and Carey Lamprecht (violin player for Jolie Holland). It was recorded in Mallorca, Brussels and various spots around France, and mixed by Christine Verschorren.
 
To take a peek into Fall Of Spring:

Click here and watch a charming little film about the making of the album

Listen to "Dis-In-Motion", a track off the album.

Introducing... Cibelle as Sonja Khalecallon

Introducing... Cibelle as Sonja Khalecallon

The world has ended. All that's left is a jungle on a floating rock where a paradise nightclub band is playing at the last cabaret on earth: the Las Vênus Resort Palace Hotel.


Cibelle in: 'Lightworks' from Crammed Discs on Vimeo.



The London-based tropical punkster gives us a tasty morsel for her glorious technicolour new album, for which she adopts the role of Sonja Khalecallon, a singer at the last cabaret at the end of the world.

Check this video for 'Lightworks', Cibelle's addictive take on a 1960s cosmetics advert jingle composed by electronic pioneer Raymond Scott.

Cibelle's new album is entitled 'Las Vênus Resort Palace Hotel', more info here.

Get free downloads of 2 exclusive new tracks by Mocky and Gonzales!

Get free downloads of 2 exclusive new tracks by Mocky and Gonzales!






Over the holiday season, Gonzales and Mocky went into the studio and cooked up two new versions of "Guiding Light", that little gem from the  "Saskamodie" album.

They are:
"Guiding Light" - Mocky/Gonzales Duo Version
"Guiding Light " - Gonzales Solo Piano Version

Just go to the Mocky artist page, click on "Sounds & Visuals" and you'll find the tracks there, ready to download.

Alternatively, you can also choose to subscribe to the Crammed Shop newsletter, and not only get these two free downloads, but also to receive the shop's newsletter, and to access other free downloads we're offering from time to time.
Just go here and register. 
There's no obligation to buy anything, promised!...


In other Mocky news:

The MOCKUMENTARY PART II is finally here!

This time, beautiful psycho-musicologist Pheline Roggan (currently appearing in Fatih Akin's new movie "Soul Kitchen") is searching for explanations: how can Mocky be able to exist in so many musical universes -  from collaborating with GZA and Alejandro Jodorowsky to joining Riverdance? 
After the irresistible "Mockumentary I" (deserving of some sort of prize, if there's anything like a Grammy for best online EPK, according to Pitchfork), watch "Mockumentary II" HERE


MOCKY joins FEIST as musical director for 2 shows at the WINTER OLYMPICS!

 Get your skis and skates: we are going to the Winter Olympics! And don´t forget your drumsticks! Mocky and Feist are preparing a special show for the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver! They'll be performing on Feb. 16 and 17, with special guests (from members of The Hidden Cameras to The Great Lake Swimmers and more!) plus a choir with percussion capes?!... and of course Mocky on drums...

New Decade, New Crammed Discs

New Decade, New Crammed Discs

So what new joys await from Crammed in this, the first year of the second decade of the century?

First up is the finest work yet from the three-headed, dancefloor-conquering powerhouse known as BALKAN BEAT BOX. Blue Eyed Black Boy, their second full album for Crammed, is out in early March, and tour dates will follow very soon...

Also ready to roll with exciting new material are LONELY DRIFTER KAREN, whose wondrous second album Fall Of Spring finds their pan-European songcraft moving to the next level. Tanja, Marc and Giorgio will be as active on the road as ever this year, keep an eye out for live announcements...

Next up, all hail the Springtime return of the mighty KONONO No.1, with their follow-up to the seminal first volume of the Congotronics series (speaking of which, there should be some more exciting news to report for "Congotronics" fans in the near future)...

And finally there's the long-awaited new CIBELLE record to look forward to – Las Vênus Resort Palace Hotel is a wildly exotic masterpiece, and should be with us in April.

Much more news on all these mouth-watering new releases very soon!

Staff Benda Bilili rocking Europe!

Staff Benda Bilili rocking Europe!

In what has become one of the most talked-about tours of 2009, Congolese rumba-funk warriors Staff Benda Bilili have been ripping through Europe with a string of scintillating live shows.
The continent's media has responded in a chorus of praise, with top TV networks, broadsheet newspapers and world-renowned radios lavishing the band with attention. Meanwhile, the end-of-year plaudits for 'Très Très Fort' have started coming in, with Mojo naming it 'World Music Album Of The Year', not to mention no. 30 in its overall albums chart. More to come!

Meanwhile, check out some of the amazing press reactions to Staff's tour below...

Press quotes 

"As tonight's show proves, Staff Benda Bilili would be a remarkable band regardless of their background. Not only do they sound incredible, they exude an inscrutable cool ... In the crowd, jaws drop, as well they should in the presence of such an extraordinary band"
-Guardian, 5 stars

"There is movement all over the stage: four pirouetting wheelchairs, and crutches used by mighty arms to swing on. Another of the band vaults from his wheelchair and spins on half-legs, ululating with a dazzling grin. All have turned apparent weakness to strength long ago... Like all the finest African bands, Staff Benda Bilili's swirling complexity removes the option to do anything but dance ... Havana cantina, Kinshasa slum, psychedelic club or London arts centre – this crack outfit would tear the roof off anywhere."
-Independent, 4 stars

"With their harmonies, bubbling rap and call-and-response chanting, they turn the Barbican into a joyous cauldron"
-NME 

"...Their first London show packed the Barbican with an audience that, six months ago, had never heard of them ... seconds after they started playing, none of the back story mattered. They were, without qualification or allowance, the most exciting band to emerge from Africa in years ... Very, very strong. Very, very great. Very, very loud"
-Financial Times

"The album from Staff Benda Bilili has already generated a degree of excitement to rival the adulation lavished on Malian pop stars Amadou & Mariam"
-The Times

"In world music circles, this eight-piece from the Congo are the most talked about band of the year" 
-Daily Telegraph

"Exotic and extraordinary their history may be, but Staff Benda Bilili are not here for refined anthropological analysis, they're a thrilling live band ripe to tear up any festival or dancehall that their touring schedule throws at them"
-The Arts Desk

-Photo (c) Belle Kinoise

Huge Cibelle installation in the streets of Sao Paulo

Huge Cibelle installation in the streets of Sao Paulo

Cibelle has been asked by Melissa, the well-known Brazilian shoe designer, to collaborate on a special limited edition shoe called Sapato Azul ("Blue Shoe") , after Cibelle's song from her last album "Las Venus Resort Palace Hotel"
Cibelle has shot a wild video and prepared a huge installation for the Melissa art gallery in São Paulo, to be launched on October 19th in São Paulo!

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