What I've Been Up To, Winter Edition

Today, January 29, 2021, Awesome Tapes From Africa is releasing Nahawa Doumbia’s Kanawa, new music from one of Mali’s greatest singers, an uplifting melding of contemporary Malian pop, traditional instrumentation and rhythms, and socially conscious lyrics. Bandcamp made it an album of the day. This one is special to me, because over 10 years ago, I remastered Nahawa Doumbia’s La Grande Cantatrice Malienne Vol 3, the first release on the Awesome Tapes label. I still remember unsleeving the vinyl and dropping the needle to digitize that LP. And here I am, a decade later, listening to her new music! In between, I’ve mastered and remastered every release from Awesome Tapes, truly the honor of a lifetime. On that note, check out Teno Afrika’s Amapiano Selections and DJ Black Low’s Uwami, both dropping soon, both mastered by me.

Other records that passed through my mastering studio this winter: Elska’s transporting, sometimes haunting lullabies on Leden, recorded at the Park Church Co-Op Cathedral in Greenpoint, Brooklyn and mixed by my longtime pal and collaborator Ted Young. Hear Me Calling, a sweet and moody EP by Coloradan Jess Parsons, produced by Mark Anderson. Some sunny bangers from my friends in Hawaii at Aloha Got Soul: Aura’s absolutely fiery “When The Feeling’s Right” backed with “Stop” and Mike Kahikina’s Hawaii’s Beautiful, digitized and remastered from the original tapes. I love this quote from Kahikina, pulled from the AGS website: “I was hoping to be a modern Hawaiian Bob Dylan, one man band kine, playing my guitar and singing about the issues.”

If social distancing has you missing the clubs, I urge you to turn out the lights and turn up Occurrence’s Privacy Invaders / Dead Sleep Best, which are a sneak preview of a full length dropping soon. Then sink into Even Gods Can Die’s Universus, mixed by Robert Kirby.

Bay Area synthesizer legend and electronic composer Pauline Anna Strom recorded her first new music in three decades, and I was graced with mastering duties. Angel Tears In Sunlight comes out next month on RVNG. Sadly, Pauline passed away in December at age 74. The New York Times posted her obituary yesterday. This record is just incredible, and I urge you all to take some time to listen and to watch this beautiful visual representation of “Marking Time,” directed by Victoria Keddie and Scott Kiernan of E.S.P. TV.

In between mastering duties, I’ve been reformatting analog tapes, cassettes and DATs for the Kitchen Sisters, the Arhoolie Foundation, and the Freight & Salvage coffeehouse and reveling in the time travel that is audio preservation.

With that, I wish you all a happy new year and go back to declicking this LP that will soon be transformed into a gorgeous reissue which I’ll write about when I get around to it in another six months.