ethiopian records: in my sleep

The Guardian on 1432 R label founder Mikael Seifu: "Electronic musicians have long mined old-world sounds to contrast with their crisp beats, but Mikael Seifu's music transports the listener all the way back to 1,000 BC. On the one hand, he's Ethiopia's answer to Flying Lotus, LA's maker of futuristic, cosmic jazz-laced bass. On the other, he draws on his homeland's ancient folk traditions. If a free-thinking techno DJ made tunes for the courts of Old Testament kings, the result would sound a fair bit like Seifu. . . . The result isn't another version of African music put through a western electronic mangle; it's in awe of age-old traditions, not beholden to them. Bring on the next 3,000 years."