Ear Sphere

Wednesday, November 7, 2012

Instrumental LPs pt. 1

Some very special rare instrumental treats, copied from full lengths i found here in Delhi...
1. Master of Electronic Instruments and long standing Bollywood Studio musician Charanjit Singh with Bollywood covers on Bass, Transicord and Steel Guitar...

Charanjit Singh LP by EarSphere
Interestingly, many claim Charanjit Singh to be the secret father of Acid house... his entirely electronic song "Ten Ragas to a Disco Beat" Smacks of Acid House five years before any such sounds were on American or British dancefloors... It also happens to be the only LP of original compositions he ever released, mainly releasing bollywood covers under his own name... This LP has jumped to the top of the list of things i want to find in my digging here...

2. Raga Jazz Style- Extremely rare 1968 release from Shankar Jaikishan, Amazing versions of classic ragas, with indian classical musicians and western jazz instrumentation... amazing fusion... Excuse the poor quality rip...

Raga Jazz Style by EarSphere
3. Van Shipley, another legendary Bollywood studio musician, Virtuoso Violinist and Guitarist, with a selection from the 1960s LP Memories... Also instrumental bollywood covers...

Still more to come...

Tuesday, November 6, 2012

Indian 7s

The First batch of many recent finds in Delhi... Plenty of Full LPs to come, but in the meantime, here are the 7-inch finds of note...
1. Nice early sixties Colombia press of Sanskrit Devotionals:

2. Kishore Kumar and Asha Bhosle From the 1975 film "Chori Mera Kaan"

3. Asha Bhosle from 1981 Bollywood hit Paanch Qaidi:

4. 1975 Dharmatma OST

5. Rafi and Asha from 1963 Dil Tera Dilwana

6. Lata Mangshekhar from the 1977 film Pandit Aur Pathan

7. Rafi and Asha Duet From 1969 Hindustani film Ek Phool Du Mali

8. Asha Bhosle and Uta Mangeshkar From 1968 Baharon Ke Saphe

More Soon, Including but not Limited to, steel guitar instrumentals from the inventor of acid house , and Ragas in Jazz Style... Stay Tuned...

Monday, July 9, 2012

BKK Vinyl: Full Lengths

Some selected rips from recent Bangkok purchases:
1. A nice Luk-Krung Crooner album from the early 70s..

2. Some funky late 70s-early 80s Isan jams... as usual B-side stuff is funkier then A....

3. Lastly a little treat ripped off a great release from the Japan based em Records. A compilation of Isan violin (an adapted Erhu) by the most famous player of said instrument in Isan, Thoghuad Failed. Compiled by the great folk at Zud Rang Ma HQ. Diew Sor Isan is the title and US distribution is through Forced Exposure.

More soon, much love.

Thursday, June 14, 2012

More Vinyl from BKK

Some selections from my most recent diggings in Bangkok
40. Sunstar ST 029- Two fine examples of early 1970s Isan Music, Side Two is a really nice, almost Ethiopian sounding groove featuring horns, piano and some serious crooning...

41. Some real impassioned male vocals on this track, not to mention the sick nasty hand percussion/bass groove...

42. Early Isan tunes, Probably from the early 60s, rare printed cover, sweet plodding Luk-Thung track... Sunstar ST-004

43. Really Amazing Morlam goodies. Track one starts of with an extended and beautiful Kaen and vocal duet, and goes into some deeply gooving classic full band Morlam with some killer Phin and really nice Ching accents... Track two is much more funkified. With the addition of some super funky guitar playing, a horn section, and a seriously funky drummer...

44. A fun Thai cover of The Champs 1958 hit, Tequila, featuring horns and reworked vocals... B side is a nice example of BKK based popular music in the 70s, lots of horns and dynamic female vocals.

Stay tuned, in the process of ripping some killer Isan full lengths... Up by the weekend...

Tuesday, June 12, 2012

Train Market Drum Jam

My dear listeners, sorry for the dearth of postings in recent months, have been rambling around Cambodia, and unfortunately, while there is plenty of music around, and I've invested plenty of hours listening to dusty tapes in markets all over, I haven't come across anything worth sharing...
Not to say it doesn't exist, just that the gems are not as readily available as they are in Thailand...
Setting up shop in Cambodia soon... Been studying, and will continue to learn Khmer, and will continue digging for recorded material, as well as interesting rural musicians...
Expect tasty Cambodian tunes somewhere down the line.
In the meantime though, enjoy this video of one of my closest friends, and excellent drummer Colin Fahrner (featured earlier in this very blog), playing at the Train Market in Bangkok with some killer percussionists from the Tiger & Maekong Drum Shop
Also coming very soon is more Vinyl rips of fresh scores in BKK... so stay tuned much love...

Sunday, March 25, 2012

BKK Vinyl, the final load

26. Here's a working version of #26, a nice funky jam from Isan with a real nice keyboard solo...

29. Sick Phin intro to some chilled out temple morlam with dramatic strings and beautiful vocals...

30.Luk-Thung with sweet horns and hand drums, male vocals something about ducks and chickens in the vocals...

31.Beautiful Kaen based temple piece, heartfelt male vocals, Kaen, hand-drums and Ching....

32. Chilled out disco track, female vocals, Killer keyboard solo...

33.Indian groove Isan tune, sweet percussion and sentimental crooning...

34. From the Indian groove to the Latin feel, so many lines of influence in Thai music... cowbell driven Luk-Thung...

35. Label-less (test pressing?) full ensemble temple Morlam, Phin, Kaen, hand drums, cowbell, cymbals, enthusiastic male and female vocals.... hypnotic percussion on side one...poor condition/poor production.

36. Two nice morlam sides, vicious horns, super wet guitar parts, and great male vocals...

37. Awesome percusion and electric organ intro, rolling into nice keys and ching, with nice male vocals...

38. Energetic funkified Isan style track... horns, keys, cowbell, gnarly bass, sweet guitar licks, righteous percussion....

39. Flute, Chorus vocals, xylo, hand drums, New Year song....

Tuesday, March 13, 2012

BKK Vinyl, the Third Batch.

21. Some really nice temple music, super traditional stuff, some nice Xylo, and raw male vocals, trance-y goodness, with obligatory horn ending... Rare Japanese press from the 70s, part of a special series of Japanese presses of traditional thai music under the name "Crown Records"

22.An early funky Isan track (Luk-Thung I suppose). Nice keys, hand drums and Ching. A bit of a beat record, in some of the worst shape of anything i picked up this time...

23. Super funky/disco intro, and pretty killer horns, nice breaks throughout, nice keys on the end...

24. Cowbell driven Luk-Thung, nice male vocals and horns...

25. Strange semi-traditional track with chorus vocals...

26. Due to Technical difficulties (read: Soundcloud)#26, which is an awesome grooveful track is coming on the next update.
27.Nice Keyboard based track with some bouncy spoken vocals...

28.Super groovin' electric organ track...

More still to come, a bit of slow going on Cambodian internet...

This Blog is a collection of my recordings from travelling around Asia