best non-english language albums?

donfers

I'm not talking instrumental stuff either so can the posse of mogwai blowhards run their mouth off elsewhere?


hmmm so let's see


manu chao is all right i guess, he kinds of mixes languages, has way too many tracks on his albums though

I got into a mexican band called mana while living in madrid, some nice tunes and lyrics were easy to understand (helping my language skills)....but I don't know, i get the feeling they might be a spanish-speaking version of bon jovi or something, I guess we are more forgiving of foreign language groups for whatever reason

I like a lot of african stuff too, especially from mali, jesus per square mile that country must have the most talented musicians in the world, I know I am getting off indie here a bit but the simple fact I started the thread is I'm not sure what the cool indie bands are in the likes of france, germany, russia, brazil etc - it seems a lot of their good indie bands sing in english like phoenix (france), deus (belgium) and the sunday drivers (spain)

finally I know people may scorn but I love scooter and tatu....never let it be said I'm not an open-minded man of eclectic taste (i'm about to banned, amn't I?)

liah

Lots of good indie and stuff coming out of Scandinavia, particularly Sweden, but the majority of them seem to sing in English.

Depending on your tastes, take a flick through my Last.fm library, I have a pretty big selection of foreign-language music buried in there somewhere.

It's a pretty big, eclectic list, though..

MrStuffins

Some super stuff coming from Africa and it is really starting to blend into some western music..... if this makes sense?

A good example for me is the album by "The Very Best" (a collaboration between Esau Mwamwaya and RadioClit).

This tune actually isnt on the album (not on my version anyway :P ) but it's a stormer:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sVIchuL6geo

Ellian

Sigur Ros is the most obvious one that's coming to my mind. Quite liked the Amadou and Mariam album too. Oh and there is one cheesy bit of pop by a Polish singer Ania Dabrowska that I like - Nigdy Wiecez Nie Tancz Ze Mna.

Miguel_Sanchez

Yr Atal Genhedlaeth is a pretty good album by Gruff Rhys.

All in Welsh I believe although Welsh sounds like Norwegian to me sometimes (not sure why) so it could be actually in Norwegian for all I know.

John

Einstuerzende Neubauten.

/end thread.

amiable

I lived in France a few years back and liked this band called 'Luke'

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_TbPoW3A4rw&ob=av2e

KeanSeenan

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cCY7Cv4RXe0

1967

Always liked Xmal Deutschland

KeanSeenan

Os Mutantes are great.

loyatemu

Jeff_Lebowski wrote: »

Yr Atal Genhedlaeth is a pretty good album by Gruff Rhys.

All in Welsh I believe although Welsh sounds like Norwegian to me sometimes (not sure why) so it could be actually in Norwegian for all I know.

also SFA's "Mwng" album

Irishrossoblu

Maná from Mexico. Their MTV Unplugged album is great.

seachto7

Tinariwen - malian band. very good.

Bluvertigo - metallo non metallo, or Zero (Italian band)

Afterhours - I milanesi ammazzano il sabato, or Ballate per piccole iene (Italian band)

paulosham

Paolo Conte is great, anything he does is worth a listen.

greyed

Check out the album ruido rosa by pato fu, an unreal brazilian band

fillmore jive

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SKHtnCBVA6s

pinksoir

Os Mutantes, as mentioned above. Incredible band. Arnaldo Baptista (their guitarist) made his own effects. One was a sewing machine that he converted into a rotary distortion dealy. It's hard to explain, but you can hear it on this song, comes in about 45 secs in:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eb4NArQ7cvk

This is my favourite song by them, it was written by Rita Lee and Tom Ze (who is a fantastic musician in his own right btw). Yer albums to buy are Os Mutantes and Mutantes. They started going a bit downhill rafter...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HT6mEHzIqPo

Then there is Camille. One of the most interesting musicians working today imo. Her first album is pretty good, it has it's moments and some great songs on it. But her second one is a masterpiece. Called Le Fil, or The Thread in English, it's built around the idea of having a thread of sound running the whole way through. Nearly all of the music on the album is human made, as in it's not actual instruments. She's a great songwriter so it's never wanky, it's always grounded in good melody and clever lyrics.

Here's a song off the first album (it's great, if a little cliché, but that's the point. So it's knowing...):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0yE12-7E51w

Now here's one off her second album:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oIB9HNvymXQ

That tonal hum that you can hear runs right through the album.

Now here's one from her latest album that's actually in English. It's a fantastic homage to Edith Piaf, and done perfectly. Wait til the end!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fqTgY4TbP8I

Here's her epk for this album. Very interesting when you see how they get some of these sounds.

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x4wf4q_camille-music-hole-epk_music

SVG

Dengue Fever! They're a Cambodian-American band with lyrics in Khmer and English.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CQYOGkCk2DA

pinksoir

Cool!

If we're going East Asian, here's a song from Kim Jung Mi's album Now! In my top 5 albums of all time. Absolutely incredible. She has the most beautiful voice, the most cliched, but also most apt way to describe it is like chocolate. Plus Shin Jung Hyun wrote all the songs. And he's a legend.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yStIttMP67w

pinksoir

Oh, how did I fecking forget! My favourite album of all time - Karuki Zemen Kuri no Hana by Shiina Ringo. It's just unreal. Words cannot describe it. It's like a film, so visual, complex, draws from incredibly diverse influences, Bjork to Radiohead, Beatles to anime theme songs, video games to traditional japanese music, classical to electronica. Such a pity all her other albums are crap (there are great moments but overall they slip into lame pop). It's like an unintentional masterpiece.

I remember the first time I heard it (downloaded illegally of course) it blew my mind. I had never heard anything like it. It's intense. You have to listen to it. But it's so rewarding, there's so much going on. Even though I've listened to it hundreds of times I'm constantly finding new things.

Then when I finally got a copy (someone kindly brought it back from Japan), it was the greatest gift, I nearly cried. I have the sheet music too. It's mental.

It opens with this beast (which cuts off at the end for some stupid reason. It's actually really hard to find stuff off this album on youtube...):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TyRxz1DfQW0

Has some of this (wait for the ebow at about a minute in. Seriously.):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uwBlG9fXwx4

Goes through this (one of the best and most inventive intros to a song ever. Wait til again about the 1 minute mark):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SSSCb7cj-BQ

And ends with this (Incredibly intelligent and complex songwriting. How all the elements are revealed one by one...):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rY546ar5Xe0

With amazing stuff in between. So so so so so so so so good. This album is better than anything released anywhere else. Honestly. It's both depressing and tragic that so few people in the west know about it. Anyone that I've convinced to listen to it falls in love with it. But it's hard to convince people. It's not exactly an album you can be told about, not bother to listen to and then happen across at some other time in the same way as would happen with western music. You have to actively seek it out. Listen to it now. Do it. Do it. Do it.

smackbunnybaby

Black Ox Orkestar - featuring members of Godspeed, Sackville and A Silver Mount Zion.
Canadians with a common Jewish heritage

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Ox_Orkestar

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I8TL4wGBx5g

Omar Souleyman - Everyone's favourite Syrian Pop Star

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omar_Souleyman

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pgRUHIeaKOk

smokedeels

French

Man, I love Gainsborough, he started genre-hoping quite a bit, everything from Reggae to Electronic stuff, but I prefer his more “Baroque” moments. This is track is from Initials B.B, it’s full of lush cinematic arrangements and Brigitte Bardot, what’s not to love?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rIAb9ClVoZc

Japanese


I’m a big fan of Surf Rock, Takeshi Terauchi tended to combine Surf with Japanese Roots Music and while I’m mostly in it for the Instrumentals this is a nice slice of Surf-Pop from some random album that would be impossible to locate.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FHo4laT6hfU

The Recliner

Sings some stuff in english but most french

Does some great movie sounds tracks too

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nvZ0DKCyLpI

Loved The Life Aquatic and his music added to it seamlessly

So I went out and bought his studio versions of the Bowie songs, he had to change some of the lyrics to make it fit in Portugese but he got Bowie's approval for the versions he did

pickarooney

Assouf - Steve Shehan & Baly Othmani. Songs in various Saharan languages.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tA9mR5OzQ34

pinksoir

smokedeels wrote: »

French

Man, I love Gainsborough, he started genre-hoping quite a bit, everything from Reggae to Electronic stuff, but I prefer his more “Baroque” moments. This is track is from Initials B.B, it’s full of lush cinematic arrangements and Brigitte Bardot, what’s not to love?

Oh baby. Histoire de melody Nelson is such a great album... I love Gainsbourg. You know there's a new film out about him?
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1329457/

I haven't seen it yet though. Have to say yer man looks quite like him.

If you like Japanese surf rock, have you ever listened to Blankey Jet City? Not exactly surf, but definitely influenced by it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2oUBJDWMn14

Here's them live:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=30FNntLaHPQ

Pretty hard to find any recordings on youtube, mostly just live stuff. Pick up Blankey Jet City 1991-1995 though. You won't be disappointed...

EDIT: Another good un. Listen to the end...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-uKpstFs53I

More goodness:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lzZ7oBdnAFg

You can listen to the album here.

Mr E

I like Madreblu (Italian trip hop/pop). Try if you like Portishead and Morcheeba.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NKYHRgjyCqI

SilverScreen

Alcest - Souvenirs D'un Autre Monde

This French band combine shoegaze and dream-pop influences with post-black metal influences so effortlessly. Their current album Écailles de Lune is amazing but Souvenirs D'un Autre Monde is a little bit better. Just beautiful.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jHNw0_TcP64

Colm!

Surprised to see only one post for Sigur Rós. I know that probably everybody knows them, but that's for a reason..

KeanSeenan

pinksoir wrote: »

Os Mutantes, as mentioned above. Incredible band. Arnaldo Baptista (their guitarist) made his own effects. One was a sewing machine that he converted into a rotary distortion dealy. It's hard to explain, but you can hear it on this song, comes in about 45 secs in:

Now that's really cool, I knew nothing about them and have only heard the first album, I fear now I'm going to get a bit obsessed, especially with little bits of info like that.

KeanSeenan

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bkQ0qZvP75Y

El Guincho is good family fun, have a jiggle to him.

pinksoir

They played over here a couple of years ago. It was pretty amazing, though no Rita Lee (she went on to have a pop career of her own and sort of disassociated herself from the band. She referred to them as the hippy band she played with when she was younger), and no Arnaldo. He was on the tour but he suffers from some ailment or other so went home early. Severe paranoia or something drug related. I think he did a lot of acid...

So that was lame. But they played all the 'hits'.

pappyodaniel

From the brilliant Vietnamese sampled instrumental hip-hop album Chinoiseries, this is The Anthem by Parisien producer Onra

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jJBI4ckmB2M

I love this album

Up-n-atom!

Noir Desire supposed to be good - they were recommended to me anyhews - I've been trying to get into Jaques Brel lately to improve my French:) Marianne Faithful does a good cover of one of his songs. Nialler9 had a link to a mixtape of Japanese stuff a week or 2 ago, think it was curated by Adebisi Shank

Birneybau

Up-n-atom! wrote: »

Noir Desire supposed to be good - they were recommended to me anyhews - I've been trying to get into Jaques Brel lately to improve my French:) Marianne Faithful does a good cover of one of his songs. Nialler9 had a link to a mixtape of Japanese stuff a week or 2 ago, think it was curated by Adebisi Shank

Check out "Scott Walker Sings Jacques Brel", one of my favourite albums of all time!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scott_Walker_Sings_Jacques_Brel

pickarooney

Birneybau wrote: »

Check out "Scott Walker Sings Jacques Brel", one of my favourite albums of all time!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scott_Walker_Sings_Jacques_Brel

Have you heard Neil Hannon Sings Scott Walker Singing Jacques Brel?

Sivski

Sigur Rós Sigur Rós Sigur Rós Sigur Rós Sigur Rós Sigur Rós Sigur Rós Sigur Rós Sigur Rós Sigur Rós

Firehen

Off the top of my head, Ta det lugnt by Dungen is an impressive album in Swedish.

fillmore jive

There is a band in Rosario who cover songs by the magnetic fields in spanish, they have an album out its brilliant

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8oeoWGkxUBw

Twee.

I got a mix of tunes by Supercar and am quite enjoying it. It was a good bit into the first song when I realised they weren't singing in English, I was just enjoying the tunes

eljono

Great thread, thanks to the suggestions here I've gotten into Camille, Dengue Fever and Onra. Really loving Dengue Fever's album Venus on Earth and this video of theirs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gty6a6_kO-0

My contribution is Deichkind, a German Hip-Hop/Electronic group. Got into them in 2008/2009 when they were announced to play Roskilde '09. One of the band members then died early that year but they still played the festival. Most of their stuff is tongue in cheek and humorous as can be seen from their videos

Komm Schon

Electric Superdance Band

eyeball kid

I don't think Ali Farka Toure from Mali has been mentioned yet, he had some great albums.

smokedeels

came across these guys recently....

Garage/Psychedelic band from Ghana with cool afro-beat percussion.

tbh it's a little scarce on vocals and I'm not sure what language it's in.... some local-dialect probably.

It's pretty amazing stuff imo

pavb2

Les Negresses Vertes

Lt. Palumbo

There's a bunch of great Klezmer bands I'd like to rant about. But seeing as I was listening to them all day today, here's some Hanggai instead:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3H2bOoCIXaM

This is becoming a party tradition for a few of us!

TwoCanDan

Haven't seen Juana Molina mentioned yet...very nice, folky, chilled out electronica from Argentina...
Have patience with this...it takes a while for her to get the loops set up, but she hits her stride about 1:30 in...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AhmWeiWB6HE&feature=related

rebel10

Saw someone else already commented on them, but I love, love, love Tinariwen.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WcqlOq1cjjc

And Ali Farka Toure
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5FO9ILi-Rt8

And also Habib Koite & Bamada. Possibly one of my favourites.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E-ZiZnycnWY

leakyboots

Jacques - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SY6nWkoDRAk

Thomas - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=29fq3jmuxJg

eljono

rebel10 wrote: »

Saw someone else already commented on them, but I love, love, love Tinariwen.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WcqlOq1cjjc

And Ali Farka Toure
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5FO9ILi-Rt8

And also Habib Koite & Bamada. Possibly one of my favourites.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E-ZiZnycnWY

Good call on Tinariwen, listening to them now on YouTube, cool vid in the link you posted

Dan_Solo

Anything by The Cocteau Twins. It's not really English...

KeanSeenan

Dan_Solo wrote: »

Anything by The Cocteau Twins. It's not really English...

I would've said the same about Deerhoof, weird mix of english/japanese.

Bodhisopha

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tx4cRw6TIIg