Rare and interesting instruments - part 1

We live in the internet era.

We can count ourselves lucky, because anyone who interested in music have the ability to explore rare/ancient or other types of instruments via the internet. In fact, 15 years ago I couldn't imagine these instruments even exist. So this list could be useful or interesting for anyone - even you grown up on electronic music like me.

In these posts (this is part one),  I will show you some songs played with that particular instrument. If you have other interesting instruments (or songs) just drop me a comment, and I can expand the lists.

Kelly Rowland and a Freemasons remix

In the latest post I wrote that  sometimes a remix is better than the original song. Here I will show a remix which is not just better then the original, but lots of people never even heard the original.

The original song "Work" by Kelly Rowland was leaked on May 31, 2007 onto the internet. This original song didn't have critics, and reached a good place on the charts in the US and some other countries, though the Freemasons team felt that they can improve this song further.
So in  2007, The Freemasons started to work with Kelly Rowland, to produce the remix for the non-American markets.

Not to say, Freemasons made an excellent work:

Whats interesting is if we look at the views counter at Youtube, this 'arabic' style remix got like ten times more views than the original song. You can find the original here.

Freemasons

Freemasons are a British dance band.

Their name is taken from the Brighton pub which they frequently visit.

According to Wikipedia: 

The duo also record and remix under the similar sounding "Freemaison" name, which is also the name of their record label that was founded in 2005.

The band is founded in 2005 and they are currently active as well, for our pleasure :)

Shakira and a not so typical remix

When the She Wolf came out in 2009 ( which is the sixth studio album by Colombian singer-songwriter Shakira) it was a big hit.

As we can read in Nielsen SoundScan:

She Wolf had sold 379,000 copies in the United States and over 2 million worldwide.

(Nielsen SoundScan by the way is the biggest information and sales tracking system created by Mike Fine and Mike Shalett, this is the official method of tracking sales of music and music video products throughout the United States and Canada.)

When looking back to the charts we see that "She Wolf" debuted at number fifteen on the Billboard 200 chart with sales of 89,000 units.

And according to Wikipedia:

..the album was Shakira's lowest charted album so far. After two weeks, the album sales total was 158,000 units.

However, the album has been moderately successful worldwide, having been certified Gold in Russia, Ireland, Switzerland and in many more countries.

It's not surprising when sometimes a remix is better than the original song. I will show a remix of the song 'She Wolf' in this post, which was became widespread in Europe. 

Its just 1:20 minutes long created by 'Deeplick Productions', and its a little bit special. The style of this remix reminds me of a Kelly Rowland song ('Work') which was also remixed and it became much better song after it. I will write about this in another post.

Enjoy.

You can find a longer version of this remix HERE.

King of Bongo - 2

In the last part I tried to show the history of this famous song called "King of Bongo" (you can find the link for the first part here). I wrote that this song has a long story. It has its roots from a 1939 recording of "King of the Bongo Bong" by the trumpeter Roy Eldridge. You can find this old recording here.
It also uses the background music from a Black Uhuru's song from their "Anthem" album.


The music has been reused for other songs such as "Mr. Bobby" which was originally released in a stripped-down form without any wind instruments on the "Bongo Bong" single in 1998.

We can read this info from Wikipedia (source) 

"Mr. Bobby" is the last single from Manu Chao's second album, Próxima Estación: Esperanza. Originally, the song was released in a stripped-down form without any wind instruments on the "Bongo Bong" single in 1998. 

The song, which is a tribute to reggae legend Bob Marley, had success in European countries such as Spain, Italy and Switzerland.

***

Of course this song continues its "career" because we can see lots remixes of this song nowdays, too .There are different styles such of DnB, or other reggae remixes. The following remix has a very nice intro:

King of Bongo - 1

Everyone knows Manu Chao's classic Bongo Bong. Well, this song has a long history.
This song existed before, and it has got other versions, but it became widespread until Manu Chao's first album, Clandestino.

Manu Chao

Manu Chao is a French singer. He is very unique in a way that he sings in a lots of languages. Well, for example didn't know he was singing in Arabic language, but we can read this info from Wikipedia:

He sings in French, Spanish, English, Italian, Galician, Arabic and Portuguese and occasionally in other languages.

Though Chao is  well known in Europe and Latin America, he has not had the same success in the English-speaking world. Tours in the USA with his band were not as successful as elsewhere. It seems Chao  focuses his efforts in the places where his musical style finds its roots.

He is a very active singer nowdays, too.

Because this song has a lots of remakes I'll show you these in two parts. In this first part, you will hear a remake from Robbie Williams. This was made in 2007 (with Lily Allen). This song landed on a really nice place in the top charts, maybe because Robbie made some short films to popularize his album.

So heres the song:

Robbie Williams - Bongo Bong
(This is a fan video, not official)

Vocal and beat in a beautiful composition.

The next song is an old, and well known among trance addicted people, and its deserved its place in TopMusicBoard. This  is a remix, actually from Jonas Hornblad.

The singer, Aruna appeared in 2007, when a song from Thrillseeker’s "Waiting Here For You" came out.
By the way, we mentioned The Thrillseekers in  this blog once.
From Aruna's facebook profile we can read the following:

It all started back in 2007 after lending her talents to the Thrillseeker’s acclaimed hit ‘Waiting Here For You’, the essential offering that made the young vocalist's name amongst her EDM peers. Courtesy of a tremendous push from the British trance legend, the first sting had been made and producers across the globe were desperate to have Aruna marry her unique vocals to their own work.

Then she made projects  with  various people like ATB, or the famous Myon&Shane54 duo.
Reading her biography we can say she has a bright future in vocal trance.

Just a remark: I'm intend to make some  future posts about Shane54, because he is one of my favourite, and he made some top mixes, so he deserves a place  here, too.

..and here is the remix from Jonas Hornblad
(Double Agents feat Aruna - Electrified)

1960's Velvet Underground

Okay, in this blog I showed almost just trance and house music, until now. Of course lots of music out there which were reached the top of the charts, but  lots of people haven't really heard them.  The intention of TopMusicBoard is  to show these "top, but haven't heard songs". These songs are not very popular because new trends like Justin Bieber and others taking over the market, and the younger generation don't really listening to good oldies. So I'm sad, because these songs deserve more.

So our next is a Velvet Underground's masterpiece.


The band  (Velvet Underground) formed in New York at the begginig of the 60's. One of its members was Lou Reed.
(I think lots of you knows his other songs like Perfect Day.)
 This band has a really long story, you can read interesting infos from Wikipedia, like

Although experiencing little commercial success while together, the band is often cited by many critics as one of the most important and influential groups of the 1960s. As Brian Eno put it, "The first Velvet Underground album only sold 10,000 copies, but everyone who bought it formed a band."

As I said the next song is a masterpiece, it became very popular after it's release. Written by
Lou Reed, in the early stages of  Velvet Underground.

The Thrillseekers remix - Calling your name

When I am say The Thrillseekers, I hope a many of you knows who they are.
This post is a remix by them - actually my personal favourite from the Thrillseekers-
The vocal and the bass in a perfect harmony...


And just an interesting info from Wikipedia:

Helstrip is also a DJ, who has performed at The Ministry, Gallery... Just twelve months after he first put needle to vinyl, he found himself invited to play at Paul van Dyk's birthday party. 2004 saw The Thrillseekers crack DJ Magazine's Top 100 DJs chart for the first time.

A good starting - Broken Bells

 I heard this song  in the beggining of 2010 in the radio, I knew at first that this will be one of  my favourite songs till my death :)

I usually listen to it when I need to do the programming stuff for my IT work, because the track is not too fast and I can concentrate while im working. A youtube comment writes: " as fast as time flys, it seems like this song slows it down"..:. So its a "chill" music but the other side the song has the "power". I actually really like it !

Anyways, Broken Bells ,the band, was composed of artist-producer Brian Burton (better known as Danger Mouse) and James Mercer. They formed in the end of 2008 silently, then the project was first announced on   2009 September.

Their starting was not bad. They ended at the #3 place of US rock chart with this song: "The High Road".
Enjoy!

An oldie hit from Tatyana Ali - Boy, you knock me out

I have just sumbled upon a new remix from Tatyana Ali and ,alas,  I don't have any info who created this mix, but its very good :)

Well, the song "Boy you knock me out" (featuring Will Smith) is  a well  known hit from 1998, which was  peaked at #3 in the UK single.

Anyways, Tatyana Ali was a  regular child performer on Sesame Street starting in 1985, and I still remember her from my childhood :-)

So I found this remix of "Boy you knock me out" and I dont really know who made and when, but its absolute better than the original song ! So its deserved to shown up on TopMusicBoard.blogspot.com 

Axwell remix and the Soulsearcher

The Soulsearcher "project" was started in England. They released two albums:

• The first name was "Can't get enough". It was a big hit. In 1999 they scored a #8 place in the UK Singles Chart. 

• The second one is "Do It To Me Again" , which reached a 32. position in the UKChart

The original song was sampled from a 1978 song, named "Let's Lovedance Tonight". You can listen it here.

This from Axwell is a remix which I think one of the best remixes of this song.

A short interview with Axwell from Faux (you can read the whole here).

Charles Darbyshire caught up with a third of the Swedish House Mafia, superstar DJ Axwell, to discuss his music, his latest single ‘Nothing But Love’, the current kit in his DJ booth & of course… ‘sexy parties’ in Ibiza.

For those of us who might know nothing about you Axwell, how would you describe your role within the global dance project. What makes you Axwell?
I’ve been one of the guys responsible for uplifting energetic vibes over the last 8 years, doing a lot of remixes and a lot of my own tracks such as ‘I’ve Found You’, ‘Kill The Vibe’ and ‘Watch The Sunrise’. Basically trying to create my own vibe in house music over the last couple of years.

And here is the song (best for summer :D )
I think it's better than the origial song, because this remix is much more 'energetic', but its possible its just my opinion..
Anywayz, enjoy !

CJ Lewis, an "old" one

CJ Lewis is originally a reggae singer, this one is from 1994, the album name was "Sweets for My Sweet".
The track name is "R to the A". This is one of the best tracks I've heard. If you listen to it, you will hear that every note, and every word is in the right place. The song has the power!
By the way its a 90's speciality, I think we won't hear like this anymore.

A comment from youtube:

Recorded BEFORE the crack dealers started setting up their own PR studios with their stables of no talent drug promotion artistes...back when music was positive and just made you wanna move.

It's one of the most unerrated songs.. Enjoy!