What river fish sing about: voices from under the water and all shades of jazz

The year started with several bright releases in various genres - from traditional jazz to ethno-electronica. There were also reissues of old records that you couldn't pass by. "Izvestia" tells about the most interesting music albums of January, which you may have forgotten to listen to.

Malia

One Grass Skirt to London

One of Europe's most interesting and gifted jazz singers of the 21st century is a perfect example of globalism in music - a native of Malawi, living in London and working with French-Armenian pianist and arranger Andre Manoukian. Malia is often (and deservedly) compared to Sarah Vaughan and Billie Holiday; however, she was introduced to jazz only as a teenager - her family was not particularly interested in music, her English father listened mainly to The Beatles, and her receiver only picked up two radio stations. It wasn't until the early 1990s, when Malia and her parents were forced to leave Malawi because of the civil war, that she was surprised to discover a bigger world - and a musical one at that.

For her seventh album, the 46-year-old singer has selected 14 songs that have nothing to do with jazz, but have become life milestones of varying degrees of importance for her. Most of them are soundtrack songs, both from movies she saw as a child in her native Blantyre and from Hollywood classics. There's Everybody's Talkin' from Midnight Cowboy, Take My Breath Away from Top Gun, Pure Imagination from the first version of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, and Here On My Own from the musical Fame. Almost all of them are arranged in the traditional jazz spirit; however, Billy Idol's hit Eyes Without a Face is turned into avant-garde reggae with soul vocals and tinkling synthesizer chords.

Brom

"Black Head"

The hooligan band from Moscow has been experimenting with modern jazz and the patience of listeners for a decade and a half - the musicians themselves call their stylistics no-jazz by analogy with New York no-wave of the early 1980s; critics suggest the term "punk-jazz", which also quite correctly conveys Brom's approach to tradition. However, in their successful and stereotype-breaking music you can hear echoes of free-jazz in the spirit of Albert Euler, and industrial noises, and even good old bop - saxophonist Ivan Bursov is at ease with his instrument and can extract the most amazing sounds from it.

The new album of the quartet came out quite eclectic - starting with a musical ommage to the poet Prigov "Dream of a Militsaner", almost danceable composition with Dmitry Lapshin's murmuring bass and Bogdan Ivlev's laconic drums, Brom goes further and further into avant-garde distances, with electronic noises of Felix Mikensky. At times this music starts to tire, but get to the finale with a dizzying arrangement of "Time, Forward!" Sviridov and the ironic-noir psychedelia of the final track with the masterpiece title "Killing a Bald Man in the Entranceway."

"Six Dead Bulgarians"

"Fracture."

Dusky Arkhangelsk geniuses of noize have gone through a lot during their 36-year history, including the tragic death of one of the founding fathers of the collective Alexey Chulkov, but in recent years have clearly come to a new creative rise and, let's not be afraid of this word, enlightenment. On new albums gloomy industrial noises are gradually replaced by thoughtful ambient chords of ancient analog synthesizers, "found" sounds and authentic folk singing.

The folk choir of the village of Ust-Pocha "Kenozerochka", masterfully recorded by the band's regular member Sergey Zhigaltsov, was responsible for it on this disk. "Bela Ryba" and "Leli Leli", sung by the voiced villagers to the accompaniment of softly murmuring synthesizers and relaxed beat, would probably decorate any compilation for a fashionable chill-out - even in Moscow, or in Ibiza. This is how age humbles the harsh masters of industrial and brings them back to the half-childish melody.

Elyose

Evidence

For some reason, the French in metal tend to gravitate more towards radical styles - just remember Gojira or Celeste - which is strange in a way, considering the reputation of the Gauls as a gallant nation. However, on the metal scene of belle France there are not only overgrown with braids and sullen masters of tooth-crushing blast beats. Here, for example, is the team headed by a beautiful girl in heels with the appearance of an anime princess and the voice of a Jericho trumpet.

Justine Daaé sings exclusively in his native tongue - and his turns are perfectly matched to the nu-metal riffs of guitarist Anthony Chognard and the locomotive pressure of the anonymous rhythm section. Even synthesizer arpeggios in the spirit of commercial industrial rock of a quarter-century ago, which cut through the musical fabric in some places, are not annoying. On the whole, it sounds as if Mylene Farmer has joined the early version of Linkin Park - and it comes out surprisingly well.

Movies and Germans: Iva Nova dance, Helloween go to Japan

December's most interesting music album

Igor Nikolsky, Hemichromis Bimaculatus, Cyprinus Carpio, Tilapia Mossambica, Cichlasoma Nigrofasciatum, Sciaena SP, Malapterurus Electricus, Gnathonemus Peretsii, Silarus Glanis, Anguilla Anguilla

"Sonic and bioelectric signals of fishes."

The Soviet authorities were suspicious of various bourgeois tendencies in art, not excluding music, but favored scientific works, especially when they could be presented to the masses in the form of something tangible, visible or, as in this case, audible. The recordings made in 1978 by biologist Igor Nikolsky and released two years later on vinyl were actually intended as a teaching aid for schools and juniors' clubs. But advanced Soviet music lovers bought up the run in record time.

"Melody" has now reissued this, without exaggeration, legendary record in digital - and, it must be said, the degree of its calming ambient impact on the human psyche has not diminished at all. The "singing" of the fish collected here is the very real billet for musique concrete waiting for its Schaeffer or Warez. Actually, 10 years after its release, samples of fish voices from the record were used in their track "Spanish Castles In Space" by the famous British electronic band The Orb.