Woebot
Well-known member
If you haven't caught up with the massive resurgence in Italian 1970s Afro-Cosmic DJ Danielle Baldelli, well there's no time like the present is there?
Simon posted some links here the other day if you want to find out more about Baldelli:
http://blissout.blogspot.com/2005_06_01_blissout_archive.html#111902067097544726 one of which I found on an another forum linking to archived mixes available online.
But I just wanted to remark how "Cosmic" has become one of the hot search terms on eBay. All the time at the moment I'm coming across records described as "Cosmic", particularly on www.ebay.it.
I was wondering whether anyone had a good list of of Afro Cosmic tunes, and for my part here is a list I've got out of Bill Brewster's article in Wax Poetics:
Eno/Byrne: Regiment
The Monks: I can Dub anything you like
Airto: Celebration Suite
Visage: We Move
Sparks: Beat The Clock
Kissing The Pink: Mr Blunt
Edwin Birdsong: Rapper Dapper Snapper
Azymuth: Young Embrace
Monsoon: Wings of the Dawn
XTC: Its nearly Africa
Codek: Tim Toum
Roxy Music: The Main Thing
Liasons Dangereuses: Los Ninos Del Parque
Yellowman:Zugungguzeng (played at 45)
Gina X:No GDM
John Gibbs Band: J'Ouvert
Plastic Bertrand: Stop Ou Encore
Rose Royce: Fire IN the Funk
Mad Dog Fire Dept: Cosmic Funk
Rah Band: Electric Fling
Peter Tosh: Buk-in-hamm Palace
John Tropea: Living In the Jungle
Passport: Juju Man
Allez Allez: African Queen
Richard Wahnfried: Time Actor
Whats interesting about these tunes is that alot of them appear familiar. Its almost as though one's eyes glaze over reading the list. Yeah yeah I know that. But on closer inspection hardly any of them are in fact familiar tunes. I reckon this is because Baldelli was a genius at finding tracks "between the holes", lots of things he seized on were LP tracks, what look like b-sides, tunes from late in a certain bands career. His love of the German Sky label is a classic case of this. I've always dismissed Sky as a really patchy late post-classic Krautrock label. I remember Julian Cope describing it as kind of the elephants graveyard of Krautrock, where great acts went to die. Also lots of this stuff is almost archetypically naff (Passport! Azymuth! John Tropea!) in the most refreshing way IMHO.
What further interests me about Baldelli is his insistence that Italo Disco was an incredibly mainstream sound at the time in Italy. Baldelli would have been embarrassed to have played Italo out. This totally chimes with my own perception of Italo, which is that, in the main, it's horribly bland. It's comforting to discover an Italian who was uncomfortable with it and notionally to discover a functioning underground.
Blissblogger sent me a copy of a CD called "Cosmic Privee 08" which is excellent. Weirdly I can't seem to find it for sale anywhere, otherwise I'd post you a link.
Simon posted some links here the other day if you want to find out more about Baldelli:
http://blissout.blogspot.com/2005_06_01_blissout_archive.html#111902067097544726 one of which I found on an another forum linking to archived mixes available online.
But I just wanted to remark how "Cosmic" has become one of the hot search terms on eBay. All the time at the moment I'm coming across records described as "Cosmic", particularly on www.ebay.it.
I was wondering whether anyone had a good list of of Afro Cosmic tunes, and for my part here is a list I've got out of Bill Brewster's article in Wax Poetics:
Eno/Byrne: Regiment
The Monks: I can Dub anything you like
Airto: Celebration Suite
Visage: We Move
Sparks: Beat The Clock
Kissing The Pink: Mr Blunt
Edwin Birdsong: Rapper Dapper Snapper
Azymuth: Young Embrace
Monsoon: Wings of the Dawn
XTC: Its nearly Africa
Codek: Tim Toum
Roxy Music: The Main Thing
Liasons Dangereuses: Los Ninos Del Parque
Yellowman:Zugungguzeng (played at 45)
Gina X:No GDM
John Gibbs Band: J'Ouvert
Plastic Bertrand: Stop Ou Encore
Rose Royce: Fire IN the Funk
Mad Dog Fire Dept: Cosmic Funk
Rah Band: Electric Fling
Peter Tosh: Buk-in-hamm Palace
John Tropea: Living In the Jungle
Passport: Juju Man
Allez Allez: African Queen
Richard Wahnfried: Time Actor
Whats interesting about these tunes is that alot of them appear familiar. Its almost as though one's eyes glaze over reading the list. Yeah yeah I know that. But on closer inspection hardly any of them are in fact familiar tunes. I reckon this is because Baldelli was a genius at finding tracks "between the holes", lots of things he seized on were LP tracks, what look like b-sides, tunes from late in a certain bands career. His love of the German Sky label is a classic case of this. I've always dismissed Sky as a really patchy late post-classic Krautrock label. I remember Julian Cope describing it as kind of the elephants graveyard of Krautrock, where great acts went to die. Also lots of this stuff is almost archetypically naff (Passport! Azymuth! John Tropea!) in the most refreshing way IMHO.
What further interests me about Baldelli is his insistence that Italo Disco was an incredibly mainstream sound at the time in Italy. Baldelli would have been embarrassed to have played Italo out. This totally chimes with my own perception of Italo, which is that, in the main, it's horribly bland. It's comforting to discover an Italian who was uncomfortable with it and notionally to discover a functioning underground.
Blissblogger sent me a copy of a CD called "Cosmic Privee 08" which is excellent. Weirdly I can't seem to find it for sale anywhere, otherwise I'd post you a link.