Check out this fascinating article on a synesthesia, a phenomenon where stimulation of one sense involuntarily induces perception in another sense.

This Swiss musician experiences tastes when she hears different intervals. Not surprisingly she has perfect pitch, which seems to be an artifact of multiple sensory cortices (auditory & taste) processing the same auditory stimulus, aka more brain power devoted towards pitch discrimination.

I didn't know that this could exist and I'm a bit envious. This puts a whole new meaning on already tasty music. So I wonder how Stravinsky's Rite of Spring, Schoenberg's dodecaphonic String Quartet No. 4 or noise music (aka no discernible intervals per se) would taste ?

I wonder how closely mapped gratifying tastes are to pleasurable sounds ... and on that note (yum!) how flexible or adaptable one's buds can be, the way you can sometimes tune your ear to something that was initially disagreeable. I'm curious also if these additional powers predispose her to certain [tonal] languages with particularly palatable pitch contours?

For me the closest I've come to synesthesia was metaphorically this time last year at my auntie's house. I could hear the sweet melodies of her owo stew beckoning my taste buds into their fragrant embrace while harmonizing my salivary glands and tongue in an exquisite anticipatory dance ... *ahem*

Last week on my way home I stopped off at the Apple store in downtown San Francisco to take a look around. Saw some really wicked HD “cinema” displays, all veritably palatable! I found it rather amusing though, how all the “can i help you sir”-people were wearing their iShuffles around their necks or on their upper-arms, all looking very smug indeed!

I considered the iShuffle when it first came out a coupla months ago, but I'm not a big fan. Aside from feeling cheap and sporting few of the features I was looking for, the iShuffle promotional campaign's constant bombardment of big-green adverts all over San Francisco touting chance and randomness has been a big turnoff. Anyway, my search for a solid flash player ended a couple weeks ago with a new iAudio5, yes the name sucks and wants-to-be, but the device is stacked and rocks harder than fruit or rivers.

So with this shuffleness in my hemispheres recently, just when I thought I thought saturation level had been reached with these devices, someone comes along and ups the iCraziness by integrating this iSore/eyesore into a shirt, the iShite ... err ... iShirt.

A very clever flash based court-métrage set to the music of this masterful John Coltrane album.

It looks like the Smithsonian has an impressive new project that aims to broaden the accessibility of various [endangered] regional musics from around the planet to people with a big interweb connection.

So like the iTunes Music Store and the myriad other online music distributors, you can sample tracks for free and then slap down $0.99 to download a proper hi-rez version. The monies collected are supposed to help pay royalties and generally support regional archives.

To test the scope/breadth of this project, I decided to flex my ethnomusicological muscles and entered in Ibibio. Astonishingly, I got back two results, with a link to samples, one of which was:

Music of the Jos Plateau and Other Regions of Nigeria
Performed By: Various Artists
Country(s) of Origin: Nigeria
Year of Release: 1965
Record Label / Archive: Folkways Records
Catalog Number: FW04321

Needless to say that I was floored ... very nice work!!

It is been interesting following this thread, but beware of the gratuitous hyper-self-conscious music-critical micro-genre wankery!!

“Harvestin' dub from the roots foundation. Cause I sharin' experimental dub education.”

check these tasty morsels.

Looks like some forthcoming 12" vinyl sweetness is sending productions into overdrive over the next coupla weeks leading up to the Winter Music Conference.

The name of the game is a new collaboration with Eddie/Triton @ Zer0 G Sounds to be released soon soon on Skor Records, as their Selector Volume Two 12" EP.

yeah!!

“Mon'Ami Zeca (Tonito)” by Canta Paula Ribas (mp3)

Mon'ami kutundé                               Meu filho não saias,
Kutundé ngoe,                                  não saias sozinho
mon'ami zeka-ié                                evita os perigos da rua,
mungu ngu moné                               meu filho dorme,
                                                     para que amanhã eu te veja.

Ai! Mon'ami nzambi iami-e!                  Meu filho, meu Deus!
Ai! Mon'ami nzambi iami-e!                  Meu filho, meu Deus!

Se u-jimbidila                                   Se te perderes, será a minha
ó mavua ma-ngitula                          desgraça!

Mon'ami mbolo ngii-sangela kuebié!      Meu filho, onde encontrarei o pão?
Mon'ami mbolo ngii-sangela kuebié!      Meu filho, onde encontrarei o pão?

Mon'ami zeka ie,                               Por isso meu filho dorme,
mungu ngu moné!                             para que amanhã eu te veja!

This is something that I've been into for a while. The translation is into Portuguese (as it was on the record sleeve) from one the Angola's indigenous languages (Ovimbundu, Kimbundu or Bakongo). Roughly in English, “My son plays, playing alone does not avoid the dangers of the street, my son sleeps, so that tomorrow I will see you. My son, my God! My son, my God! If you're lost, it will be my disaster! My son, where I will find the bread? My son, where I will find the bread?”