Nonetheless

At just 22 years old, Daymé - a singer, arranger composer, and choir director is already a veteran presence in Cuban music, and is fast gaining international profile. She says she has sung all her life and recalls her four-year old self performing on every block in her neighbourhood. ‘Fun stuff,’ she says, ‘Wearing crazy dresses and singing like a rumbera (Rumberas are the street parties in Cuba where you hear its exploding Afro-Cuban rhythms and chants – sometimes in Yoruba). She has been performing semi-professionally since the age of 8, and became lead singer with the big band Los Primos at 14. She has performed with Winton Marsalis, and was invited by the Canadian saxophonist Jane Bunnet to perform in Canada.

As one of Japan's first heavy metal bands, Loudness was quite literally playing it by ear when the group released its first album, 1981's The Birthday Eve. A somewhat awkward affair, the album finds the young but ambitious members of the quartet struggling to establish their identity by translating whatever sounds and styles they could from the established Western metal bands of the time. Interestingly, Loudness made it a point to give their songs English titles from the very get-go, even though, except for the very basic choruses, all the songs were still sung in Japanese by vocalist Minoru Niihara. Despite this curious arrangement, from a musical standpoint the band is already remarkably proficient here, as seen on surprisingly mature offerings like "To Be Demon" and "Rock Shock (More and More)." Guitarist Akira Takasaki is already firmly established as the band's leader, but his obsessions with Van Halen-styled guitar pyrotechnics sometimes get the best of him, resulting in somewhat derivative tracks like "I'm on Fire" and "Sexy Woman." A promising start nonetheless.

The Mediaeval Baebes are one of world music's treasures. The vocal ensemble's exquisite storybook beauty came to life in 1996 when ex-Miranda Sex Garden chanteuse Katharine Blake aimed to set her fascination with the Middle Ages to music and theater. She and 11 additional musicians and singers — Miranda Sex Garden's Teresa Casella, Audrey Evans, comic writer Marie Findley, Nicole Frobusch, Ruth Galloway, Karen Lupton, Claire Ravel, Australian native Cylindra Sapphire, Carmen Schneider, Nichole Sleet, and New Zealander Rachel Van Asch — defined a contemporary musical approach while incorporating Middle Ages Paganism and spiritual moods and sentiments.

These 1993 recordings (released on a 1997 CD) are an excellent showcase for trumpeter Kenny Wheeler. Six of the eight compositions are his (all but drummer Pat Labarbera's "Kind of Bill" and the closing standard "Summer Night"). …

As Kevin Whitehead's liner notes to this release reflect, Sanders "pays explicit tribute to his late mentor John Coltrane – as this set's Coltrane-oriented sound makes unashamedly clear." Actually, Coltrane penned only one of the eight tunes, while Sanders wrote six, but the spirit of the master looms heavily throughout.