World Fusion...

I've recently started getting into World Fusion music. For those who don't know, World Fusion is a catchall for the next stage in the World Music movement. It basically came about because all ethnic music got lumped into one single category.

By the time the world music fans started to write music they had been influenced by music from all over the world, and so they did the logical thing - they combined it all. It's slightly weird hearing a celtic jig written to a dance beat with a traditional african bass underneath, and yet somehow it works.

At the moment I only seem to have got a mainly seems to be an African/Celtic mix, but I'm hopeful I shoudl start finding some more stuff soon. I reckon Paul Simon's Real World Studio would be the best place to start, since it was deliberately set up to expose more people to music from around the world - one of the few examples of a record studio that has an aim outside of jsut making money (although I'm not stupid enough to believe making money isn't a small part of it!).

Real World also has the distinction of being the home of the very cool AfroCelts (who either used to be, or are again the AfroCelt Sound System) a band I've been enjoying for years now They keep things interesting by inviting in other artists pretty much whenever they can to get more influences from more places in the world - so I'm not really sure if the Afrocelts title holds anymore...

Also, check out Baka beyond I'm pretty new to them, but I'm liking them. They're much more subtle - and less dancy than the afrocelt, but still fun to listen to!