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Show notes for the 304th Mużika Mod Ieħor podcast featuring music by performers from or in Malta:

Manwel T – Love You More
Malta prime dub master returns with a fresh sound built on this track from Giant Panda Guerrilla Dub Squad. I love opening the MMI podcast with this type of sound, so much so that you’ll find I’ve (almost) always so whenever I’ve included Manwel T’s dub’s on previous editions of the podcast.

Ira Losco – What I’d Give
In preparation for her next album, expected for release in time for the Christmas shopping spree of 2012, one Malta’s best known pop performers has released this track as a single. Ira Losco has come a long way since her previous dalliances with pop rock. Her latest incarnation shows her maturing into the worthy world class entertainer she should be recognized as.

Sarah De Bono – No Shame
Fresh from her success on the Australian version of hit television talent show The Voice, this young Maltese-Australian singer has just released both a single (on 29 June) and an album (on 13 July entitled No Shame. Surely Maltese pop fans will soon discover her the way they did with Natalie Gauci a few years back.

Sempliċiment tat-Triq – Iswed Tnejn Zokkor
Closing off this week’s podcast with some of the outstanding Maltese-language hip hop from S.T.T., which has become a force unto itself in the local rap scene. The video produced in collaboration with No Sweat Productions shows that although certainly not attempting to appease mainstream tastes in any way, there’s more to these guys then mere explicit rhymes. If not the new poets, these performers are at the very least the rightful heirs of the spritu pront mantel, which they’ve swiped from traditional għannejja without much fuss.

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 follow each new episode through the MMI Podcast: Facebook Fan Page or on MySpace. If you have no idea what any of this means, just enjoy listening to the podcast on the player right below this text.

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Show notes for the 303rd Mużika Mod Ieħor podcast featuring music by performers from or in Malta:

Ellie & the Oscars – It’s Not a Crime
Eliza Borg and her band are back with another great track. Not sure why this band isn’t more popular in Malta than it already is. They sound really good and I suspect they’re not half bad live, even though I haven’t caught any of their gigs yet.

G-Force – Wasal il-Ġimgħa
What can I say? This is Maltese hip hop, which is slowly but surely finding its own voice within the subculture and spreading out into the mainstream. A video like the one produced here by Dirty Iris will go a long way in creating the indelible mark I’m talking about with regards to both the genre and the new generation of fans of Maltese songs.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uB1px01X3FM

Kontroll – Easy
Is this a cult classic that previously escaped my attention? Does this band belong in the same category as BNI, RAS, Norm Rejection and Pupi tal-Logħob? And do they really have an album outa this year? Why is it there’s so little I can find about this band online? I really hope M3P can rectify this.

Stefanos – Navigate
Stefan Mifsud continues to record more rock guitar instrumentals as Stefanos for a new album due out after the end of this summer. This track is one of these new recording ands sees the guitarist return to his preferred style of strumming.

Inverse Shift – Impregnable
Andre and Josef from the defunct metal band CoreFrequency last year teamed up with Max from Abysmal Torment to form this new band called Inverse Shift. They have produced a debut album entitled Endgame. This is the opening track from this debut album. More of the same will be greatly welcome by the many fans they have a quid over the years in their previous band, particularly those who can appreciate some of the interesting departures they’re experimenting with here.

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 follow each new episode through the MMI Podcast: Facebook Fan Page or on MySpace. If you have no idea what any of this means, just enjoy listening to the podcast on the player right below this text.

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Show notes for the 302nd Mużika Mod Ieħor podcast featuring music by performers from or in Malta:

Jane Doe – S.M.O.
The musicians in this band have been playing together since 2008 but it was only last summer 2011 that they started calling themselves Jane Doe, recording their debut single Shivery in January 2012. This follow-up release is part of their upcoming EP. If the rest is as good as all this, I must say that it will be a strong contender for one of my personal picks for this year come the annual poll for the MMI Listeners’ Top Picks.

The Crowns – Never Ends
Recorded at Temple Studios and with a video made by No Sweat Productions, led by Nick Morales, makes this band clearly one that is taking themselves seriously enough to ensure that they achieve an even stronger profile than they acquired in their initial outings over the past couple of years.

3 Artists – Our Time
Niki Gravino, Errol Sammut and Nick Morales, each known in his own right on the local music scene over the past decade or so have teamed up to create this Mobile Internet GO commercial that will launch on Monday 23 July 2012. It’s great that such a major Maltese corporation has picked alternative rock musicians to promote its wares. Whoever is behind this campaign deserves a pat on the back from more than the industry pundits who will undoubtedly see that this move will help them reach a segment of the audience that’s not as easy to reach as the mainstream, without alienating the latter.

Bletchley Park – Tight Red Dress
On 14 July 2012 Bletchley Park are set to launch their next album at V-Gen in Paceville. The album is called My Body Fighting and judging from this song seems to be harder than their previous offerings. I’ve seen this band live but I like the extra touch they give to their recordings, so I’m particularly looking forward to this album.

Harriet Cohen – India
I’m not sure why Bletchley Park singer Deborah Borg Brincat picked the name of an early 20th century British pianist to record this song as a soloist while her band prepare to launch their album. I fail to see why she wouldn’t record it under her own name or why this song would not be included on the upcoming Bletchley Park album. In any case, it’s worth listening and watching, while the contributions of Red Electrick’s Peter Borg and Matthew James Borg (as well as violinist Simon Vella) make it even more noteworthy than it would have been otherwise.

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 follow each new episode through the MMI Podcast: Facebook Fan Page or on MySpace. If you have no idea what any of this means, just enjoy listening to the podcast on the player right below this text.

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Show notes for the 301st Mużika Mod Ieħor podcast featuring music by performers from or in Malta:

Muxu – So Good
Matt Mercieca has really cemented his presence on the local music scene as the supreme maestro pop as Muxu. This song shows that he can (almost) do no wrong. The video is relatively low budget but works excellently; produced by Mark Frendo’s Fiction Focus Pictures. His choice of Amber as a backing singer is brilliant. All in all this is simply another hit from Muxu, who deserves to be even more respected than he is by his peers and pop music lovers alike.

Jacinta Caruana – Message to the World
Fresh from her recent visit to Malta, this Maltese-Australian singer is featured on the MMI podcast for the very first time. Her debut EP features several tracks showcasing her versatile singing style. I particularly like this one, which is a collaboration with fellow Australian singer Gary Pinto. Jacinta Caruana is also the lead singer with a band called Groove Child and can’t see why I wouldn’t want to feature them in a future edition of the MMI podcast.

Brooke – Fairytale
I always feel that Brooke should be more well known than she actually is. The video for this song, which has been in her repertoire for about a year or two, clearly demonstrates that she has the prerequisite qualities (at least on screen and in recordings) that most big-time pop producers look for. Perhaps this song will do it for her this summer, but I somehow feel that she has yet to reach the millions of pop fans that deserve to be introduced to her.

Three Stops To China – Detox
This grunge punk trio first appeared on the local rock scene just a year and a half ago and they are now poised to release their debut EP called Rite on 7 July 2012. At this rate I think they may very well be on their way to give Cable 35 a run for their money, even though the latter grungy trio have made great strides over the past few years. Now that’s a battle of the bands I’d pay to see!

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 follow each new episode through the MMI Podcast: Facebook Fan Page or on MySpace. If you have no idea what any of this means, just enjoy listening to the podcast on the player right below this text.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 18:46 — 17.3MB) | Embed

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