Cumbia is a Latin Americana traditional music form that originates from Colombia and has ever since spread across the whole Spanish speaking sub continent. It blends elements of indigenous South American melodies, African rhythms and European ways of developing harmonies and progress chords. With that style in mind as model nowadays many young artists from the Western hemispheres begin to develop an electronic variant that brings new life to the dancefloors of the old ghost town. Among these Danish electronic artist and DJ Kenneth Rasmussen and his band JUNGLELYD formed in 2015 explore the pathways of modern South American electronic music. Digital cumbia, Tropical bass, Zouk, Moombathon, modern sounds based on traditional Latin music for dancing purposes, all that had a slight impact on the creativity of JUNGLELYD which combine digital devices and analogue instruments in their music. The delicate flute playing adds a touch of souljazz to the hypnotical mix. All rhythms are a perfect blend of electronic beats and live percussion, while guitars, bass, brass and wood wind instruments build a rather vivid melodic superstructure. After two EPs in 2017 the band will release their debut album in 2020 on SOUNDS OF SUBTERRANIA, a label that explores the adventurous paths in music.

The album begins with a relaxed cumbia styled tune that is an anthem to the greatest life elixir I personally know. Coffee. The lightweight guitar harmonies develop, float upon spacey synthesizer waves and follow rhythmical patterns that just intrude your locomotor system where they cause ongoing dance moves. Slightly more complex in its rhythmical structure, still as groovy as a cool piece could be „Boots“ comes jumping up and down from your speakers. Tropical island images enter your mind but still the electronic elements and fantastic melodies keep this song from being just a typical Latin music tune. They add the psychedelic expression of spacerock to the haunting music from the Andes. And haunting is the best adjunct to descripe the third tune „Lucerito de la Manana“ which prominently features singer Luna Ersahin on lead vocals and mystical South American pan flutes. I am not certain if that keeps the guinea pig invasion away, to point at my favorite episode of South Park, but anyway, this song with even comes up with a touch of psychedelic jazz at the end due to freaky saxophone lines. Dub, psybient, cumbia join together for the next tracks and in opalescent colours JUNGLELYD play their mostly instrumental music to their audience, which consists of psychedelic fanatics, cumbia lovers and electronic music aficionadoes. One can find a whole new spiritual world in this futuristic exotica style. The jungle to which it drags the listener exists only on giant computer screens all around the listener’s mind. I can see the dancefloors in todays clubs steam and boil while dance hungry souls float through the night. The musicianship of this collective is extraordinarily high, the wind instruments showcase an unusual dedication and determination for additional colour effects on mainly electronic sound creations. And the sweet twangy guitars here and there bring back memories of times when the ideal world also found its expression in dreamy sounds. This album is an ongoing dream and you can make it yours if you dare to explore the digital jungle created by JUNGLELYD.

Debut LP from The Mark Vodka Group, Nova Scotia delivers again. FFO Coneheads, DLIMC, Buzzcocks and sunshine in the city. More effortlessly catchy brilliance from Nova Scotia, Canada, that your ears, speakers and shelves simply cannot live without. You want a quality guarantee? Well, howsabout if I told you that The Mark Vodka Group includes members of the Booji Boys? Their 2019 opus ‘Tube Reducer’ should still be rattling the walls of your house and making your neighbours question the wisdom of moving next door to one of those ‘punk rockers’ the newspapers warned them about. This is a different prospect to the Boojis, of course. While that group buries deceptively tasteful hooks in clouds of ear-lacerating distortion, The Mark Vodka Group opt for a more immediately accessible level of audibility, while still keeping things firmly in the box marked ‘lo-fi’. They sound like a bare-bones Descendants at their most irritably bratty, stealing the Oblivians’ homework and doodling stupid faces all over the most insightful parts. Or maybe the other way around. Point is, they do smart and stoopid simultaneously and they’ll make you wanna dive onto a dancefloor to revel in both sides. As they’re not ashamed to tell you, however, the band have been around this music long enough to grow pissed off with… well, what have you got? Scenester elitism (‘Big Time Rocker’), the sudden trendiness of punk among previously sceptical normies (‘Everybody’s Punk Now’, which also boasts a killer Buzzcocks homage at its peak) and everyone dumb enough to cross them.

Truth be told, punk rock doesn’t come out of these lyrical screes too well, but the Mark Vodka Group are too in love with the stuff to truly let go. Besides, as ‘Mark’s Blues’ laments at the album’s close, even when the rest gets you down, there’s always booze to keep us going: “The drinking hasn’t let me down yet.” Hey, Mark Vodka ain’t just a clever name. This is a damn fine record, though. Will Fitzpatrick.