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Felix Blume - Death in Haiti: Funeral Brass Bands & Sounds from Port Au Prince (Discrepant, 2018)

Pretty intense album culled from many hours of field recordings made by Felix Blume in Port Au Prince in 2016. Scope out tracks like "Maestro Turenne's Brass Band "LOT BO RIVYE A"" with a bereaved woman wailing for her mother over a not-as-somber-as-you'd-expect brass band tune. Or, well, "Cries" which is both haunting and cathartic. "Prayers, Singings and Maestro Midouin's Saxophone Solo" and "Marijuana, Rhum and Music around the Graveyard" are beautiful meldings of those very things - not sure if it happened that way naturally or if it was edited after the fact but either way it's mixed beautifully. Very interesting, haunting, and at times strangely uplifting sounds.

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Albums of the Year 2017 // New Releases

//40 Migos Culture (300 Entertainment) //39 Kyle Dixon & Michael Stein Stranger Things 2: A Netflix Original Series Soundtrack (Lakeshore) //38 Unsane Sterilize (Southern Lord) //37 Hans Zimmer & Benjamin Wallfisch Blade Runner 2049: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack (Epic/ASG) //36 Ricardo Villalobos Empirical House ([a:rpi:r]) //35 Brockhampton Saturation II (Question Everything Inc./Empire) //34 Fire-Toolz Drip Mental (Hausu Mountain) //33 Clams Casino Instrumental Mixtape 4 (no label) //32 Yves Tumor Experiencing the Deposit of Faith (no label) //31 Lil Yachty Teenage Emotions (Virgin/EMI) //30 Thriftworks The Feather and the Sword (no label) //29 Paul White & Danny Brown Accelerator (R&S) //28 Keiji Haino, Jim O'Rourke & Oren Ambarchi This Dazzling, Genuine "Difference" Now Where Shall It Go? (Black Truffle) //27 Nazoranai Beginning to Fal...