i just picked up balkan beats. vol 2, some of it is great, i havent heard the first one yet.
recently got another fanfare ciocarlia (romanian gypsy band, who are on the balkan beats comp) record entitled 'radio pascani', which has some amazing tracks on it...have another one somewhere, or at least another record by a similar band, left it somewhere, cant place it.
got a collection of albanian folk songs on the 'topic' label today, very interesting, lots of instrumentals, incredible sounds on there. ballads, instrumentals, ritual songs, shepherd melodies..
i quite like the work of goran bregovic as well. i love this berzerk song of his called 'kalashinikov', complete gypsy gabber tempo brass band... punk.
im also very interested in this thread, so would appreciate anyone else's input.