Jazz, Modern, World and Beyond…

There are some lush flavors on the menu for Deep Threes Radio #8. The Waitiki 7 serve up a helping of New Sounds Of Exotica, the band’s second album. Their musical DNA is intertwined with percussionist Lopaka Colon’s family ties - the bird calls laid down by his father Augie were a signature of Exotica originator Martin Denny’s sound. Here’s a demo reel of the next generation of lounge music chirping.

Here’s The Waitiki 7 performing Denny’s “Voodoo Love” at the 2008 Wassermusik Festival in Berlin.

Jazz flute legend Mark Weinstein broke ground recording with Cuban rhythm sections in the 1960′s and fusing Brazilian, African and Jewish influences into his sound. We’ll hear a track from his 1995 release, Algo Mas.  Here’s a stripped-down 1999 performance of “O Nosso Amor” with guitarist Paul Meyers.

Life for jazz-rock fusion ensemble Planeta Imaginario revolves around their home base in Barcelona, Spain. Their Biomasa album is generously flavored with found sound and a dash of sampling. Here’s a live performance of “El jardin de las vacas allegres”

The band took their name from the 1980′s Spanish TV show that chronicled the fantasy world of a teenage girl and her imaginary friend. Here’s two clips that will give you an idea of what the show was all about, or leave you permanently warped if you are self-medicating.

Smokey torch songstress Robin McKelle has been burning up the French jazz scene for the past several years. The Rochester, NY native is back home on a U.S. tour to support Mess Around, her latest album. One track will cap off a set on Deep Threes Radio #8.

Here’s a clip of Robin from April 2010 giving Paris something to remember her by with a rousing version of Leonard Cohen’s “Everyone Knows”.

From The Olympia in Paris from 2008, here’s Robin with Buddy Johnson’s “Save Your Love For Me”.

Big John Dickerson has been tearing it up from his base in Minneapolis for decades. We’ll get a taste of his blues, soul and rock influenced sound with his 1998 project with Blue Chamber, Arms Of The Blues.  Big John and Down Right Tight got a Mill City crowd jumping with their cover of Tower Of Power’s “Get Your Feet Back On The Ground”.

We’ll take a detour from the electric highway and go on a carriage ride set to acoustic music on Deep Threes Radio #7. French guitarist Claude Bourbon will pace the excursion with a piece from “The Travelin’ Man”. Claude’s mastery shines in his version of “Bolero”.

Hawaiian duo Hapa is touring the Western U.S. and Canada this summer. They accompany a dramatic solo hula dance in this next video. Charles Kaupu sets the stage with his world famous chanting.

Nawang Khechog will guide us through the valleys of our soundscape with a track from Quiet Mind. His “Daily Prayer And Practice Of The Dalai Lama” scores this colorful slide show from Vasusuzy.

One fine morning last week, I put on a New York (public radio) station - on my cell phone. With apologies to The Velvet Underground, I couldn’t believe the underwriting announcements I heard for the Dalai Lama’s talks at Radio City Music Hall. Despite all the implications, I couldn’t stop doing the computations of the Rockettes joining His Holiness onstage. Here’s a video of revered cooking show host and author Paula Deen shakin’ it with Santa’s fine, fine helpers…

… finally, it took this string of random images from Degs and Gaz to make me feel saved by “Rock & Roll”. And it was all right.

Since being founded on Fat Tuesday 2003, the Portland based MarchFourth Marching Band has given up matching uniforms and shiny new instruments for the redemption found in a captivating sound circus-like stage show. Their new album, Rise Up, evokes the New Orleans sound and we’ll hear a track during Deep Threes Radio #6.

Here’s a taste of MarchFourth’s set at Burning Man last year. Then the band lurks in the shadows on the video for “Pilo Erect”.

Let’s move from the dark and creepy to the bright and disaffected. New Yorker Matt Marks talks with Corey Dangle about his campy pop opera album The Little Death: Vol. 1, out this week. Oh my God, we have a killer track cued up for you.

We didn’t have to cast a wide net for your obligatory DIY cover videos. Matt and partner in crime Melissa Hughes have posted several taken from their show “The Melly & Mafoo Variety Hour”. You could call it a cabaret act, the term sometimes used by performers who want to impress the folks back home with how well they are doing in the Big Apple.

Here’s Matt and Melissa with a finger snapping foyer performance of The Magnetic Fields’ “Yeah, Oh Yeah”. Then they go where Julia Nunes would not dare with Matt on ukulele for “Straight Up”. Simon?

Several artists with long musical resumes grace the soundscape of Deep Threes Radio #5. Master drummer Paul Wertico keeps busy by holding his new Mid-East / Mid-West Alliance together. Here’s part of an improv set that Paul posted from the “Live From Space” DVD.

Paul joined the Pat Metheny Group in 1983. His long and memorable tenure came to an end in 2001, but there was the occasional side job, like this 1986 wedding. June brides take note.

LCD Soundsystem released It’s Happening Now this week - somebody called me and asked to play a long track on the show. Leader James Murphy took a big step towards founding DFA Records when he produced the Law of Ruins album for Six Finger Satellite. Here’s pictures from a tour of some of the Vatican’s deepest recesses set to “Fur Immer Liebe”.

We’ll also hear something from the new live album by the Stan Kenton Alumni Band. Who could they have possibly played with before that gig? Here’s Kenton leading His Orchestra performing “Malaguena” in 1962 on Jazz Scene U.S.A. hosted by Oscar Brown Jr.

“Peanut Vendor” is a Kenton classic. Bull uses it as the soundtrack to show off his many faces (and helmets).