Listen In: Juana Molina, Michna

Recently, I discovered Juana Molina and her 2003 album Segundo. It fits in to my current phase of mellow music listening rather perfectly. Here's what a review from Emusic has to say:

“The second album by Argentinean singer Juana Molina calls attention to itself by understatement. Listen to it inattentively, and it's sunny background music, with more than a hint of vintage Latin-American pop (both Brazilian bossa nova and the Uruguayan music Molina has claimed is closer to her heart) — she's got a winsome, breathy voice, and her fingers scarcely brush the strings of her acoustic guitar. But as you pay closer attention to it, it keeps getting weirder, deeper and more beautiful, like the sound of a pond at night surrounded by frogs and bugs.

Actually, there's wildlife all over Segundo — both real and artificial. The album, Molina has said, was recorded mostly as first takes, at a time (1998-1999) when she was living in California; plenty of ambient sounds creep into the recording. "El Perro," in particular, has a lyric about an endlessly yapping dog that can occasionally be heard in its background (Molina treats it as a random percussion element, surrounded by a digital whine that keeps warping away from true pitch and rumbling electronic growls). And for a record that's more or less built around the meditative voice-and-guitar model, Segundo is actually richly layered with quiet but unearthly synthesizer tones and textures. They're subordinate to her calm, liquid singing — "technology must be a servant of music," she has said. In Molina's hands, though, technology is a particularly lithe and devoted servant: on the eight-minute "Mantra del Bicho Feo," she vocalizes wordlessly over squelchy, insectoid synths and rattling drums until all her handiwork fades away, and the only singers left are the birds who've been adding their harmonies since the beginning of the song.”

A bit more upbeat, and a bit more dancy. It's still the way I like it. Michna and the new album Magic Monday is rather awesome, also. Fun to listen all the way through, too. With little audio snippits of New York, and a one way conversation with one guy in particular. You could picture roaming around Michna's native Brooklyn. Here's what an emusic review says:

“A former Diplo collaborator and one-time Jandek remixer — about as unlikely a resume you will ever find — the young Michna is the newest DJ in the Ghostly International roster, and immediately its least serious and most fun. Across Magic Monday, Michna gets coy and playful, composing pieces that fans of Gotan Project and their ilk would absolutely dig. The moody "Bumper Car Masters" and the opening pairing of "Triple Chrome Dipped" and "Swiss Glide" stand out in a big way. Recommended.”

Fun days! Click on the album art to take a listen