January 2000

Today Macaco El Mono En Ojo Del Tigre Edel 0083702FAC Kicking and screaming into the unkown with the unknown. I had never heard of this outfit until this century. As far as I know, Macaco is Spanish. I have no clue what these guys are singing about, except maybe Mamahemp. Hmmm... I have no trouble understanding most of the music, though. Sometimes they are too heavily into the latin stuff. But most of the time they sound like a cross between a harder Manu Chao and The Specials. And that's a very good thing in my book.

Yesterday Bruno K. Öijer/Brynn Settels Skugga Kommer Rub-a-Dub SUBCD03 Swedish poet extra-ordinaire teamed up with keyboard maestro friend and holed up in the studio. Officially they spent 800 hours there, 1985-86. They were then screwed by The Big Record Company, who initially was to license this. Instead, the vinyl version was released on Rub-a-Dub Records. Unfortunately, they've never had any promoting muscle to speak of. So, for many years, this little gem was impossible to get hold of. Now the album is remastered and one extra track from that fertile period has been mixed and added. It's really great that this truly fascinating amalgam of words and music gets a second chance.