Atoms for Peace

I'm nursing a bad cold. I feel like this is something that happens to me every autumn. It must have something to do with the change in the weather. At least I have the new Radiohead album to console me, along with several get well soon wishes on Facebook.

The cold has also meant that this week's Mużika Mod Ieħor podcast was delayed by several hours into Sunday morning rather than appearing at the customary time on Saturday evening. I honestly don't think that anyone really cares. After all, it's not like it has a global impact like Al Gore's work to raise awareness on climate change. I think he deserves the Nobel Prize; at least he gets to stay in the headlines and impress his message further, for better or for worse.

The 86th edition of Mużika Mod Ieħor features five tracks that stylistically blend together quite nicely. The opening track comes from a DJ duo called Tanishia. Their remix of Everything But the Girl's classic hit Missing is as good as any I've ever heard. Naturally, it helps that I love Tracey Thorn's voice and she's regularly appearing on my iPod playlist with her new album Out of the Woods. Just for the record: I'm not saying all this because she's a University of Hull alumna.

Apparently, Crimean rapper Dimal has made Malta his new stomping ground. His presence undoubtedly serves as a source of enrichment to the emerging Maltese rap scene. While it's clearly not everyone's cup of tea, it's good to see that other non-obvious elements are infused into this genre as it continues to grip more and more young fans across the Maltese islands. Listen to Dimal's My Game closely and you may see what I'm on about.

Frank Cachia and Edwin Balzan are the dynamic Duo Blank who have released an EP entitled Constitution. Playing the original track on my podcast means it is now on the list of nominations for the 2007 MMI Top Picks. The list of nominations keeps getting longer and longer, but within a few more weeks you'll be able to vote on it, just like last year.

Another addition to the list of nominations has to be Baresine's mini-album Island Pearl; if that's what it's called and it has actually been released. Get Up is the most obvious recent track from this singer but I like Selfish, which I've included on this week's podcast. I find it hard to nominate titles of songs I only hear online when there's clearly a broader effort behind them. Still, perhaps it's better than nothing.

Following up on last week's inclusion of Danjeli's brilliant Kakofonija, one of two new release from Pinkpube, this week's podcast comes to a close with an excepert from a tune called Stop by Dot. His new 3-track collection is called Aleagramma and just like Kakofonija is available as a free download from Pinkpube's website.

The RSS feed for the Mużika Mod Ieħor podcast is available here or you can simply click here to subscribe directly with iTunes. You can also add the latest episodes to your My Yahoo! page. If you have no idea what any of this means, just click here.