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Makambo - Geoffrey Oryema


Do me a favor and listen to this song. It's by an African gentleman named Geoffrey Oryema. It's very soft and gentle, and his voice is like honey. I have no idea what he's singing about, and I don't care. It's just...

You'll see.

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I have this theory that revealed itself to me when I first heard this music...

Astrae - Vas

The music of the Haradrim


...that far back in the First Age, some few of the Elves headed south, and were thought lost to the great deserts. But in truth they wandered until they came to Far Harad, and there brought word of the Valar to the people of that land. And they, seeing the beauty and power of these otherworldly folk, built lovely temples to their gods.

When I hear this piece, I imagine slender, dusky priestesses swathed in layers of red silk, dancing beneath an exquisitely filagreed roof open to the sky, singing praises to Al-Barat, the Lady of the Stars.


(Many years ago, I worked with Azam Ali (the voice of Vas) at the Bodhi Tree in Los Angeles, when she and Greg Ellis were just starting their musical careers. This is off their first album, Sunyata. Azam has gone on to great success with her lovely music and mysterious lyrics. This makes me very happy.)

Hey all! Been a while since I did a Cafe post, so here's something fun...

Transglobal Underground - Delta Disco

Eqyptian pharoahs fell from the sky
fell from the sky
and played the blues

Pyramids and pharoahs
The river Nile is like a disco
The ebb and the flow
the ebb and the flow...


These guys are AWESOME. Hot midnight sinuous dance beats, comical sexy mythological.