Helly Luv – Risk It All
The song sounds as if it’s aimed at the international market, but the video is remarkable. Islamic State and its associates delight in banning pop music and smashing instruments, but here’s a Kurdish singer who takes them on with R&B, high heels and no headscarf, in a video featuring petrol bombs, girl fighters and lions.
Sam Lee – Blackbird
Sam Lee matches traditional songs with a no-nonsense vocal style and impressively original settings. This is a song from his new album The Fade in Time, and features Lee backed by piano, banjo, percussion and brass.
Songhoy Blues – Irganda
The best new African band of the year, thus far, are these young graduates from Mali, who escaped to Bamako when Islamist extremists took over their home region. They mix traditional influences with the attack and intensity of a blues-rock guitar band, as shown by this song recorded at Celtic Connections.
Bert Jansch – Angie
Next month sees the rerelease of the 1965 debut album by one of our finest and most influential guitarists and singer-songwriters. It includes his songs Running from Home and Needle of Death, and his classic treatment of Davy Graham’s instrumental Anji, which Bert recorded as Angie. Here’s a live version from later in his career.
The Unthanks – Mount the Air
The single version of the title track from the new album, in which a traditional melody is reworked with piano, strings, and jazz-influenced trumpet work from Tom Arthurs. But the exquisite, gentle melancholia of the harmony vocals from Rachel and Becky is what makes it so distinctive.
Doug Sahm – Is Anybody Goin’ to San Antone?
Sahm was one of the great figures of the American country-rock crossover scene of the 70s. Notorious for his wild lifestyle, he was also an inspired multi-instrumentalist and rousing singer-songwriter. This is how he sounded playing live in Austin, Texas in 1975.
Yiddish Twist Orchestra – Bagels
YTO are a classy band of musicians who like to imagine that they are in the East End of London in the late 50s, at a time when Jewish styles were blending with new music from across the Atlantic. They play anything from ska and Cuban styles to rock’n’roll – a great live party band.
O’Hooley & Tidow – Two Mothers
From The Hum, one of the finest and most original albums of 2014, here’s a gently brave and emotional song that shows off the duo’s exquisite harmony vocals and sensitive piano work. It was recorded live at the Holy Trinity Church, Leeds.
Eddy Grant – Gimme Hope Jo’Anna
The perfect example of how a carefully written song can be rousing, danceable and angry. An anti-apartheid classic from the 80s, an era when white South Africa was under attack from economic sanctions, upheaval in the townships, African National Congress campaigns – and pop music.
Ibibio Sound Machine – Let’s Dance
Led by the flamboyant British/Nigerian singer Eno Williams, Ibibio Sound Machine are a London-based band who mix African styles, gospel and electronics, along with tight percussion and brass lines. This is their best-known song, as performed live at Trans Musicales in 2013.
