TuneDig

What is this which stands before us? A long shadow spreading its magic o’er scores of artists all bearing its seal, certainly. But if we go Back to the Beginning, we can still unearth lots to learn from the band forged from steel unto a wicked world on fire. Whatever your connection to Sabbath today (and certainly you have one), look beyond the lore with us before you know the way you’re going to feel.

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For Fela Kuti’s 88th birthday, we’re joined by our first-ever guest—Nick Alt of Vinyl Me, Please—to Felabrate the man who reminded us that “music must be for revolution,” to unpack VMP’s beautiful new Best of the Black President box set, and to revisit our original 2022 conversation about the vital, visceral document Expensive Shit.

The story of Fela Kuti — one of the most famous people on an *entire continent* passionately struggling to liberate power to more people — is absolutely one worth deeply knowing, regardless of whether you find yourself drawn to Afrobeat or (cringe) “world music.” But once you know it, it’s almost impossible not to fall in love with Fela and Afrika 70 as their revolutionary grooves rewire your brain in magical and meaningful ways.

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Music can be this?! Five North Carolina dudes took the full range of the human spirit and musical styles into the woodshed, and from the loom came a technicolor dreamcoat of power, precision, and progress that we’ve worn with pride through nearly 20 years of long, strange trip.

Join us in looking back with gratitude for getting to be there during a special band’s watershed moment and looking ahead with renewed enthusiasm for the boundless possibilities still beyond the dark side of the moon.

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As the 2010s cleaved culture into fractals and alienated humans from their being, Tahliah Barnett beamed down from the cosmos, a biblically accurate angel contorting into shapes embodying pure emotion. Her singular, decade-defining debut offers prescient wisdom for our AI age: the path to the world begins back in our bodies. When (FKA) Twigs moves, you move.

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Time's funny, innit? As today's youth excavate the nineteen hundred and nineties for the ecstasy of seemingly simpler times, here lies a fossil record containing so much of the DNA of how it was done — layers upon limestone layers of cultural source code. Keep digging and you might just find a place to get off your biscuits. The Big Beat goes on.

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For our money, this is what running through the halls of your high school and screaming at the top of your lungs actually feels like. And why shouldn’t the unreal world be a 250-BPM confetti cannon of primal-screaming sweetness? Take 21 mere minutes to blast-beat your brain and body into a fireworks show and then let’s shopping after.

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This episode’s meaning is neither deep nor hidden: the Nile is a river. To good times, that is. If the savoir faire, stellar musicianship, and seismic influence of Nile Rodgers and Bernard Edwards’ organization don't suit you, then to cite a very wise t-shirt: “disco doesn't suck; you just can't dance.”

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Illmatic’s impact on hip-hop is a foregone conclusion — one listen and it ain’t hard to tell why. But as we unpacked the lyrical density, the layered samples, and the hyperlocal lens of Nas taking us to the Bridge, we found they represent, represent something deeper in the American mythos and our cultural consciousness. In the land of the free and home of the brave, life may be a bitch, but the world is yours.

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It may be true that No One Ever Really Dies, but at the turn of the millennium, a young, wild, and free new wave in culture most certainly came alive. Whether or not you were around and aware in the moment of the Neptunes’ cultural dominance—and the decidedly counter-cultural bomb N.E.R.D planted underground—it's worth the star trek to the 21st century sound and style’s Big Bang.

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Odetta — a must-know titan of American music and culture — once noted that young people “learn about American history through battles.” But her dream of liberation was shaped much differently: “I learned about the United States through this music, through the songs that I sing.”

As we live through the kind of historical moment that makes most folks want to lie down and die, we can — like many heroes before us, from MLK to Maya Angelou — look to the legacy of 1964 and Odetta for strength to insist upon our lives.

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Once upon a time in Bollywood, one magical man made enough music to fill a million moments—and made space for hundreds of other artists along the way. Of the 331 scores “Pancham” composed in his lifetime, 1978's “Shalimar” is a uniquely compelling introduction to his technical prowess, transcendent alchemy of cultures, and tremendously joyful love of a life full of song.

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“That’s the thing about pretty faces… We don’t expect them to belong to the fighters— the junkies and monks and cockroaches who’ll survive every atomic bomb and suicide attempt and outlive us all.” - Lindsay Zoladz

Broken English is searing, singular snapshot of surviving to spite the devils (who’ve gotten far too much sympathy in the story so far). You’ll love it forever with its good and bad weather.

We may have lost Marianne Faithfull this year, but not before she outran the darkness. As we close out a dark year and look ahead for light, there’s a lesson to be learned from her life.

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Any denier that all art is political need look no further than the smoothed-out soul slipstream of Sade, a group defined by its economics. Rare output, minimal arrangements, reserved volume, and, of course, the premium implied by “Love Deluxe”—a title derived from the idea that true love is among a precious few luxuries that can’t be bought. Our world’s clearly longing for more longing, and we discovered a truly transcendent delicacy as we unboxed Sade’s brand of desire.

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When you think of true "artists" in music, who comes to mind? Charles Mingus embodied its romantic ideal, for better and for worse. His magnum opus "Black Saint" is more than even jazz's cosmic form can hold—it's the full-bodied essence of a master composer, peerlessly inventive bassist, and clairvoyant critic of the real America. In it, you’ll find what his collaborator Gunther Schuller called "the widest ranging musics you can find composed by one single human being."

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“Entertainment!” is described by Gang of Four’s Jon King as “a record about young people smiling and dancing in the face of disaster.” Uh oh, sound familiar? This Leeds-born slab of Brechtian boogie reminds us that to navigate a world where everything is (small-p) political, dancing and dialectics belong together. Free your ass and your mind will follow.

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This is the tale of two lonesome cowboys who got down, turned around, and went to town catching lightning in a bottle on their first try together. Whether or not their decade-defining country anthems lit a flame in your eye in the 90s like they did ours, Ronnie and Kix offer a lens through which outlaws, in-laws, crooks, and straights alike can look for ways to learn to love again.

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The name "Oumou" derives from an Arabic word meaning "mother of." It is associated with dignity, wisdom, and maternal strength. Southern Mali’s Oumou Sangare has come to embody her namesake for millions around the world, and it all began when she was just 19 years old, channeling the magical music of hunters through her powerful and purposeful voice and creating a moment that captivated an entire country. Hers is a story everyone should know.

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In the words of one of her groundbreaking forebears, “You feel free? You want to try some wild s**t? Thank Missy.” Since the very first frame of “The Rain” entered our eyeballs, Missy has made the avant-garde accessible, pointing us to a future full of more funk and more fun simply by standing fully in the splendor of her space-age self. Come (supa dupa) fly with us back to the moment where Missy’s magic began.

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God is a woman and she plays the guitar loud … y’all come catch some Holy Ghost in your hips.

Hear our hallelujah for the love story of the queen of rock ‘n roll and the mad daddy holy rollin’ on a river—upstream all the way—and boot scootin’ through a fun and freaky heaven and earth of their own design. The Cramps were Dionysian, devilish, dangerous, and damn good, and they remind us that life can be, too. If you can’t dig this, you can’t dig nothin’.

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Life’s a bit heavy to chew on these days, so we reached into the pocket of our mid-2000s jeans and found an old piece of Dandelion Gum to chew on instead. As soon as its neon syrup hits your tongue, you’ll wonder why you hadn't let this "future pop for now people, today" melt you, melt you, melt you yet.

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