Quantcast

Call for Feature Essays About Any Aspect of Popular Culture, Present or Past

Music
cover art

Alejandro Franov

Khali

(Staubgold; US: 11 Jun 2007; UK: 24 Sep 2007)

Alejandro Franov is Argentinean. He helps Juana Molina with her albums. On Khali he uses instruments that imitate the flowing sound of water, rain, or rivers. He likes harps, sitars, marimba, kalimba. He also likes African music from the south and west. The two songs that are not credited to Franov himself are described as “the traditional music of Shona, Zimbabwe.” And the harp sounds like a kora. It might even be a kora. The Spanish credits call it an ‘arpa’ with no mention of it being an arpa africana or just a normal arpa. The gamelan has had an impact on him, and so has the raga. He introduces the album with a short “Micerino Alap” on the sitar and goes on from there, rippling and musing and making mbira boings. The music is sometimes monotonous, as rivers can seem monotonous. Things pick up at the end when he brings the natural noises of birds into one of the Shona tracks, thickening the music. He has some of the intercultural instincts and multi-instrumental talent of a Bob Brozman but not the same popularising drive, nor the same need for beats, verses, and choruses. Alejandro Franov is different. He likes to float.

Rating:

Comments
Now on PopMatters
A Painting Come to Life: 'The Mill & the Cross' (Short Ends and Leader) [Fri, 4:00 pm]
A Far Too Safe... and Strained... 'House' (Short Ends and Leader) [Fri, 9:00 am]
'Safe House' Is Ersatz Edgy (Reviews) [Fri, 8:06 am]
The 10 Greatest Shakespeare Film Adaptations of All Time (Short Ends and Leader) [Fri, 7:50 am]
  1. 'Nebraska': Bruce Springsteen's 'Heart of Darkness' (Columns)
  2. The 10 Greatest Shakespeare Film Adaptations of All Time (Short Ends and Leader)
  3. Slipped Discs 2011 - Part 1: From 13Ghosts to Friendly Fires (Features)
  4. The Best Games of 2011 (Features)
  5. Not-So-Central Casting: Kevin Smith and the Birth of the Reality Podcast (Features)
  6. The 10 Greatest Movie Spies Ever (Short Ends and Leader)
  7. Slipped Discs 2011 - Part 2: From the Go! Team to the Phoenix Foundation (Features)
  8. Slipped Discs 2011 - Part 3: From Real Estate to Youth Lagoon (Features)
  9. Lana Del Rey: Born to Die (Reviews)
  10. The Top 15 Madonna Singles of All Time (Sound Affects)
  11. Get Off of My Cloud!: 'Collecting' Music in the Digital Age (Features)
  12. Leonard Cohen: Old Ideas (Reviews)
  13. Google and the Production of Curiosity (Marginal Utility)
  14. Carole E. Barrowman’s Authorial Journey to Hollow Earth (Features)
  15. “Don’t Let Me Fall”: Hip-Hop in the Age of Austerity (Features)
  16. Tower Songs: Townes Van Zandt (Columns)
  17. Black Bananas: Rad Times Xpress IV (Reviews)
  18. Paul McCartney: Kisses on the Bottom (Reviews)
  19. The Gay Ole Countryside (Columns)
  20. Of Montreal: Paralytic Stalks (Reviews)
  21. Counterbalance No. 67: John Coltrane’s 'A Love Supreme' (Sound Affects)
  22. Nick Cave’s The Death of Bunny Munro: A Rock Star’s Midlife Crisis or Valid Literature? (Features)
  23. The 10 Best John Coltrane Solos (Sound Affects)
  24. A Look to the Past, An Insight Into the Present: The Use of Gender in 'Mad Men' (Features)
  25. A Tale of How Great Journalism Became Revisionist History: Grambling State U Football (Columns)
  26. Chairlift: Something (Reviews)
  27. Mark Lanegan Band: Blues Funeral (Reviews)
  28. The Asteroids Galaxy Tour - "Heart Attack" (Cosmic Kids Remix) (PopMatters Premiere) (Mixed Media)
  29. The Barbaric (and Poetic) Yawp of Shelby Lynne (Notes from the Road)
  30. After Cease to Exist: The Far-from-Final Report of Throbbing Gristle (Features)
PM Picks
Music Archive
Announcements

© 1999-2012 PopMatters.com. All rights reserved.
PopMatters.com™ and PopMatters™ are trademarks
of PopMatters Media, Inc.

PopMatters is wholly independently owned and operated.
PopMatters is a member of BUZZMEDIA Music, MOG and Guardian Select.