Mohammad Abdul Muttaleb | Best of 1 & 2

Listen to "Ma Bes Alsh Alayya" from Vol. 1


Listen to "Is 'Al Mujarreb" from Vol. 2

Grab Vol. 1 here and make off with Vol. 2 here.

Yet another find at the Nile Deli (2512 Steinway Street, Astoria); I believe I picked these two up back in April.

I think of the shop keep, who is always behind the counter and who may well be the owner, as The Sphinx--which, yes, I realize is a potentially offensive bit of culturalizing, if we can make that a word. Nevertheless, I do think of him this way as, nothing I ever say or ask him ever seems to register. He's unreadable, and I worry sometimes that my combing through his CD racks for no less than an hour ("Can you see!? They are the same CDs that were there last time you were here!") secretly, profoundly irritates him.

No, of course he's never said anything remotely like the quoted bits in parentheses above. He's never said--to me, at least--anything. Not even the day after Warda's death, when I made a special trip to find albums by the late great Algerian panarabist singer. I remember handing a couple of items to him that day, including the one Warda CD I didn't already own, and noting, to my amazement, that he didn't even seem to register to himself who it was--Warda! and she had just died! OMG!--that he was mechanically stuffing into the black plastic bag with my other, equally unremarkable, purchases.

It isn't, mind you, that he's mean. Nor have I ever picked on up any anger, repulsion, hatred, loathing, hostility, enmity nor even minor annoyance vibes. He is, quite simply, the definition of sphinx-like.

In addition to knowing nothing whatsoever about the Nile Deli's shop keep, I know equally little about Mohammad Abdul Muttaleb, other than that he was an Egyptian singer. I don't even know if he composed his own songs, though I like to imagine so. The fact that I don't know anything about him is a testament not just to my own ignorance--which is as vast and as dry as the Sahara--but to the egregious deficit of 411 in English about expressive culture outside of our own sinking corner of the world.

I do know this, though: on a scale of "no mental or emotional response to stimuli" to "pleasure center overheating and in danger of shutting down," these two volumes are "extremely download worthy."

Thanh Thúy | Một Chuyến Bay Dêm

Listen to "Tam The Bai" (and wait for the guitar solo)

Get it all here.

Here's the third album I have by the supremely fabulous Saigon diva Thanh Thúy. The other two are here and here. Obviously, my number one life goal for the immediate future is to find the other two volumes in this series.

When I do? You'll be the first to know.

Thanh Thúy | Buồn Trong Kỷ Niệm

Listen to "Tau Dem Nam Cu"

Listen to "Hinh Bong Cu"

Get it all here.

This is Holy Fucking Shit-level pop, the kind of music you'll take one listen to and wonder who the evil motherfuckers are who have kept you from experiencing it for so long.

Everything I know about Thanh Thúy, along with an earlier recording (with some fabulous guitar work) is in this post. I'll be upping a third recording tomorrow, so stay tuned.

Thanh Thúy | 24 Giờ Phép

Listen to "Mua Nua Dem"

Listen to "Ga Chieu"

Get the whole thing here.

While combing my shelves for something interesting to share with y'all last night I came across three CDs I've somehow not yet posted by the utterly sublime Saigon chanteuse Thanh Thúy. Featuring recordings from before 1975, the Nhac Vang Thuc Hien Truoc 1975 series provides thousands of Vietnamese immigrants with hours of nostalgic memories--and the rest of us with a window onto a now-long-lost world. 

Born Nguyễn Thị Thanh Thúy in 1943 in Huế, Vietnam, Thanh Thúy began her singing career in 1959 at the age of 16. The next year her mother died and she took responsibility over her younger sisters while simultaneously becoming a national superstar--she was voted the most popular singer in south Vietnam for three consecutive years in the early 60s.

And, of course, we know what happened in 1975. I have no idea where Thanh Thúy wound up or if she is still singing.

This gem was recommended to me by a woman whose family owns a fairly large Vietnamese media store right on the northern edge of Montreal's Chinatown. While there for a work-related conference several years ago I made a point, each day after the conference events had ended, of walking through Chinatown and stopping in to this place, where each time the same woman greeted me, making suggestions, including this CD. If I remember right, she said Thanh Thúy's voice was smoky and bluesy, and that I would most certainly like it.

As, most certainly, will you.

If you do like it, let me know, and I'll probably post the the other two I have by her.

Joey Boy | 67 Songs

Listen to "It's On"


Listen to "Censor" (best use of bleeps ever?)


Listen to "อวัยวะ"


Listen to "Books of the Bible"

Get all 67 songs here.

Born Apisit Opsasaimlikit in 1975, Joey Boy began his career in the 1990s, recording his first hit, "Fun, Fun, Fun," with Canadian reggae artist, Snow, in 1995:



I discovered my first Joey Boy record a couple of years ago in a Vietnamese media store on Argyle Street right off the red line in Chicago. (Get it here.) As I described it then, it was "quite honestly one of the most bizarrely satisfying purchases of a musical nature I have ever made." That still holds today.

The present mix includes everything I have by one of the more inventive rappers in the world, deduped for your downloading and listening pleasure.

"Excuse Me, Please!"

Things people have said to me over the years upon my walking into South Asian video stores.

Interview with Adam WarRock

I turned 50 today. An interview I did with nerdcore rapper Adam WarRock was just published here.

10 Bollywood Memories I'll Take with Me to My Grave

A piece I wrote (with lots of embedded video) just went live on Indiewire's Press Play here.

Jintara Poonlarb | Krob Krueng Vol.3

Listen to "Sao toong kula tum ai"

Get it all here.

Found yesterday at Thailand's Center Point in Woodside, Queens. Jintara "Jin" Poonlarb is to contemporary mor lam and luk thung what Hakim is to shaabi: it's most prolific and yet distinctive practitioner. While I've yet to develop enough of an ear to immediately distinguish Jin's voice from any number of other Isan-born female vocalists, I can usually tell when it's Hakim being blasted from the morning bagel and coffee or halal lunch cart. But, then, I've been listening to Hakim for more than a dozen years and to Jin for a mere two or three.

In addition to picking up every one of her CDs that I can find, my other Jin-related mission is to someday, somehow find--online or on VCD--her music video "Arlai World Trade" ("Mourning the World Trade Center"), which, in an article titled "The Morlam, the Merrier," ThaiSunday.com described thusly: "The reigning Morlam superstar of Thailand laments the attacks of Sept. 11 while young, bare-midriffed Thai girls gyrate in front of a surging American flag."

Update: Peter Doolan found it; and it looks like someone literally just uploaded it 3 weeks ago:

Yui Yatyoe

Listen to the first track



Listen to track #4



Listen to track #9


Get it all in a single blaze of glory here.


My favorite New York music blogger, Peter Doolan, is leaving the city in a couple of days to spend the next year (at least) in Bangkok. He and his girlfriend and I had tentative plans Friday evening to take a trip together up to Arthur Avenue for Italian eats and Albanian CD store diving, but circumstances (mine, alas) dictated otherwise. So, tonight's post is dedicated to him, with thanks for Monrakplengthai (which I hope he keeps up while in Thailand), for all of the translation/transliteration work he's done for me here and, last but not least, for introducing me to Thiri Video where, as some of you know, is where most of the ungodly great Burmese music I've posted here over the last year or so has come from.

I've spent the last week on vacation, using the time mostly to finish up three or four writing projects I'd been asked or commissioned to do. As a reward to myself today, and partly because I was thinking of Peter's immanent departure, I took a bike ride out to Woodside for the spicy-hottest pork larb I have ever had in my life (at Thailand's Center Point) and to dig through their large selection of CDs, all of which are on sale for half price--or about $5 a piece. This one, by a Thai Country singer whose name I don't know, and a Jintara Poonlarb collection I didn't already have, were the clear winners. (I'll post Jintara a bit later. It's by far the hardest-rawqin thing by her I've ever heard.)


What struck me about the present album, in addition to this woman's rather marvelously rough-around-edges voice, is the music production/instrument choices, which at times are, frankly, eyebrow raising. Which is to say: sublime.

PS: Thanks, Peter, for identifying the singer!