Visioneros

Peter Gabriel announced his new album entitled “SCRATCH MY BACK.” The concept is that he does a cover of one of his favorite artists and the artist hopefully will return the favor by covering a favorite Peter Gabriel song. You can listen to this album at THE GUARDIAN UK.

I’ve been a fan of Ryuichi Sakamoto since his early (1979) electronic music days with Japanese tecnopop band “Yellow Magic Orchestra.” YMO are considered the pioneers of the tecnopop genre, a major influence to modern Japanese popular music and to British bands like Japan and Duran Duran. His participation in the 1983 movie “Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence” (Dir. Nagisa Oshima) for which he wrote the theme song “Forbidden Colours” sung by David Sylvian vocalist for the band Japan, brought him major attention. His acting alongside David Bowie made the movie a memorable performance.

One of my favorite music videos from the MTV golden era in the 80s.

Ok so we’re at Nature’s Express restaurant in San Diego, CA, eating a plate of delicious vegan preparations. I start noticing that the music they were playing was interesting, fresh and loopy with mantra-like melodies. So I get up to ask and the bright girl at the counter tells me it’s the Animal Collective. I get home and find this catchy piece “My Girls” which seems to me like The Blue Man Group on acid. They’ve got great video artists working with them and have more cool songs but this is my favorite song so far, I guess the lyrics hit home for me, enjoy…

Animal Collective - My Girls (Lyrics)

Is it much that I feel I need
A solid soul and the blood I bleed
With a little girl, and by my spouse
I only want a proper house

I don’t care for fancy things
Or to take part in a precious race
And children cry for the one who has
A real big heart and a father’s grace

I don’t mean to seem like I care about material things like a social status
I just want four walls and adobe slabs for my girls

Feeling a bit of separation for dear ol’ George. So glad we still have his wonderful music. I remember a godbrother telling me how our gurudeva AC Bhaktivedanta Swami once commented that his last name Harrison also meant “Son of Hari” and that stuck in my head since. I liked that when asked by strangers what he did for a living, George would answer “I’m a gardner”… and he did love taking care of his beautiful garden when he wasn’t busy with music.

For those of you who have not been swept off by Imogen Heap’s storm of creativity, I am posting this video of this live performance “Live at Studio 11 103.1FM” recording/playing multiple loops of her voice with the “Ableton Live” elastic audio program and making it look so easy. I first listened to her at the end of Zach Braff’s movie “Garden State,” with song “Let It Go” recorded with Guy Sigsworth while both performed as the electronic duo “Frou Frou.” She has done songs for the Narnia movies, Heroes TV Series and is presently working on her new album, you can catch funny personal video posts of her progress on her Official Imogen Heap Channel on YouTube.

Supersoul Connection is the very cool conscientious hip-hop band from Ljubljana, Slovenia. Their bright lyrics blast through the lies of media broadcasts and popular ignorance. They are elevating consciousness around the world with their tasty sound beats and creative videos. Have a listen, spread the word: