The League Of Extraordinary Tracks II: 1. NOT IN ENGLISH – Polls

This is where you VOTE in the League Of Tracks Season 2 Week 1. You’ll need a registered account on the site to vote, so we can keep it to one person one vote (or to log in via Twitter/X – we are working on other login options!)

Please vote for up to FOUR tracks from the ones you don’t already know. You can hear them all in the playlist post!

League Of Extraordinary Tracks S2E1: Not In English!

Please pick up to FOUR of these tracks.

DO NOT PICK TRACKS YOU ALREADY KNEW!

Spotify and YouTube playlists in the playlist post.

The poll has expired!

The League Of Extraordinary Tracks II: 1. NOT IN ENGLISH – Playlists

The League Of Extraordinary Tracks II: 1. NOT IN ENGLISH – Results

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actualee simpson

18 October 2023 15:21

Yay, time to crank up the DISCOurse! Of course I have nothing to say yet and have absolutely no idea how to vote, an absolutely stacked group (I’ve already put CENT on my 2023 playlist). I’ll probably do capsule reviews of everything before casting my votes.

mondosalvo

18 October 2023 16:10

Anyone else having an issue with actually submitting your ballot? The choices are highlighted, but nothing happens when clicking the “vote” button.

???? ????????? ??

18 October 2023 19:26

Reply to mondosalvo

I just logged in w my x-twitt account and registered a vote. it looks ok rn. checking…

admin

18 October 2023 19:30

Reply to ???? ????????? ??

definitely seeing votes registering now

mondosalvo

18 October 2023 16:15

Reply to mondosalvo

nm I just read the tweet about this.

Edward Still

18 October 2023 19:40

First of all Tom thanks for inviting me to play this second league. Really thrilled to hear what everyone comes up with this time around.
Good opening round but listening through the Spotify playlist there were 3 aside from my own that, I really really liked and 1 more from YouTube to round it out. My most surprising vote was for CENT which I feel I would have liked a lot less if it was an English Lang song. Vaudou Game, MC Solaar and Jeans Team round out my votes.

koganbot

18 October 2023 20:13

Corry Brokken “Danswijsje” not playing for me on either playlist but here’s one that does play (assuming it’s the right song):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7k3zcwAzAjk

healingandy

19 October 2023 10:41

Blimey, a strong set to start off with – compliments to all nominators.
Could only alight on four, so in no particular order, I particularly enjoyed MC Solaar (a right earworm for the last few days), Prins Polo, Familjen and Deckadas. Honorable mentions go to… all the others, really. Apart from my nom, obvs.

j_e_l

19 October 2023 12:07

This was a good set of songs – I enjoyed the Cure-a-like sounds of Deckadas, the bleepy bop from Jeans Team, thought Prins Polo was nice, CENT was awesome, good to see the ladies from BiSH having varied solo careers

Job

19 October 2023 14:56

MC Solaar definitely the best of the bunch, but alas, I already knew it from back in the day. Nice to hear again, though! I have a feeling this type of rap music translates much better to non-Francophones than the more current (and grim) trap musique.

Dan Bright-Amaya

19 October 2023 16:41

Strong start to the new season! Miniboss was my standout song.

vinnycrackers

19 October 2023 17:20

Ditto re : this list, nothing I knew. 3 of my votes are : Tshetsha Boys for anticipating hyperpop loops, Deckadas for being the most goth, Jeans Team for being most to my taste and then a hard 4th choice!

dorsalstop

21 October 2023 10:48

Couldn’t vote for Familjen, Jeans Team or MC Solaar because familiar, but perfectly happy to vote Deckadas, CENT and esp. Vaudou Game – don’t think I’d ever heard music from Togo before. Lush!

Jeff Worrell

22 October 2023 21:42

The Lemons and Deckadas are Not For Me but a strong set otherwise. CENT might be my new favourite band. Think I already knew “Dansewisjse” (did we have it in a previous bit of FT orgafun?), and so MC Solaar (doesn’t he look YOUNG in the video!?), Jeans Team (more than just ein keine Melodien then) and Familjen round out my ballot.

Jeff Worrell

22 October 2023 21:47

Reply to Jeff Worrell

Ah, having just seen rabbitfun’s post on the playlist page, I realise now it is the original Danish “Dansevise” we had before and not this Dutch cover version.

actualee simpson

22 October 2023 21:45

Reply to Jeff Worrell

Ended up voting before blurbing but this was my exact slate

Baltimore Jacks

26 October 2023 23:07

All new to me and I liked basically everything to varying degrees. Went narrowly with Vaudou Game, Tshetsha Boys, Lemons, and MC Solaar.
The set did somehow feel a bit less varied than sets from S1.

mondosalvo

27 October 2023 21:49

Disappointed that Deckadas started off so strong only to fade down the stretch, but I’ll be honest… I only learned of that song’s existence about 24 hours before I sent it to Tom lol. I’ve listened to it about 50 times since I found it—total bop!—but it’s not like I’ve been keeping it my own special secret for 30 years.

rabbitfun

27 October 2023 22:41

Passing (pretty hard) on “Monad”, “Espectros” and “決心”, they are NOT my cup of tea, and wishing my absolute favourite “Nwampfundla” (Shangaan/Tsonga Electro rules so hard!) as well as “Bouge de là” (Solaar rules (ruled?) trop fort!) all the best – I already knew ya…
I may or may not have heard the Dutch cover of “Dansevise” (now spell it with me: D-A-N-S-W-I-J-S-J-E – see, that wasn’t so hard now, WAS IT?), but I know the original, and anyway, it’s charming, but too out-of-place old in this selection.
That means there are five tracks in contention, that’s one too many. I left out “París Norðursins”, which I liked a lot (and the Icelandic sounds cool) and would have been somewhat of a piece with my top-3, but I gave the coveted fourth spot, with the closest of margins, to “Miniboss”, because it’s ultimately more in my wheelhouse, even though I found it somewhat underwhelming.
My number three is “Camisole”, very solid stuff, but it’s the Swedish and German elektro/synth/wave/core that gladdened my heart here the most, so it’s a tie at the top between “Det snurrar i min skalle” and “Oh Bauer”.
This available-on-Spotify remix of “Oh Bauer” is a keeper too: https://open.spotify.com/track/3mZzChdpmOMcGhI5ae5Weh?si=6948cba806e44b45
Back to my favourite, Limpopo’s Tshetsha Boys: I just came across this Spotify playlist – tracking “the evolution of [the] Xitsonga sound from 1975 to 2023”. I fully intend to follow its curator’s advice: “Play on shuffle mode”!
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/4mnuWQRzcxnmywbWRwPsBV?si=10ad14db06b649c3
<iframe style=”border-radius:12px” src=”https://open.spotify.com/embed/playlist/4mnuWQRzcxnmywbWRwPsBV?utm_source=generator” width=”100%” height=”352″ frameBorder=”0″ allowfullscreen=”” allow=”autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; fullscreen; picture-in-picture” loading=”lazy”></iframe>

rabbitfun

27 October 2023 22:53

(re-posting this comment, because it seems to have disappeared for some reason – btw, you may know me from Twitter as LokpoLokpo)
—–
Passing (pretty hard) on “Monad”, “Espectros” and “決心”, they are NOT my cup of tea, and wishing my absolute favourite “Nwampfundla” (Shangaan/Tsonga Electro rules so hard!) as well as “Bouge de là” (Solaar rules/ruled trop fort!) all the best – I already knew ya…
I may or may not have heard the Dutch cover of “Dansevise” (now spell it with me: D-A-N-S-W-I-J-S-J-E – see, that wasn’t so hard now, WAS IT?), but I know the original, and anyway, it’s charming, but too out-of-place old in this selection.
That means there are five tracks in contention, that’s one too many. I left out “París Norðursins”, which I liked a lot (the Icelandic sounds cool) and would have been somewhat of a piece with my top-3, but I gave the coveted fourth spot, with the closest of margins, to “Miniboss”, because it’s ultimately more in my wheelhouse, even though I found it somewhat underwhelming.
My number three is “Camisole”, very solid stuff, but it’s the Swedish and German elektro/synth/wave/core that gladdened my heart here the most, so it’s a tie at the top between “Det snurrar i min skalle” and “Oh Bauer”.
This available-on-Spotify remix of “Oh Bauer” is a keeper too: https://open.spotify.com/track/3mZzChdpmOMcGhI5ae5Weh?si=6948cba806e44b45
—–
Back to my favourite, Limpopo’s Tshetsha Boys: I just came across this Spotify playlist – tracking “the evolution of [the] Xitsonga sound from 1975 to 2023”. I fully intend to follow its curator’s advice: “Play on shuffle mode”!
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/4mnuWQRzcxnmywbWRwPsBV?si=84508bc5f8b045ac

koganbot

28 October 2023 14:31

Familjen – Crude electro-clank, like looking back at the days of exploiting electronics for their goofiness, and unkempt vocals. Good chucklesome video, pretending the vocalist is a mad scientist testifying at a local zoning-variance hearing.

VauDou Game – Is the secret ingredient here Prog? Something orchestral in the organ-bass ominousness, maybe, the keyb indulgence, the guitar melodrama? –I did a speed review of other VauDou Game tracks: the more they fit categories – here’s jazz, here’s funk, here’s Afrofunk – the less interesting they were; whereas the more I couldn’t figure them out, like this one, the better.

koganbot

28 October 2023 14:37

Corry Brokken – Felt I was hearing a kind of “pop” (as in “not rock ‘n’ roll”) that you only get in title songs to late-’50s, early-’60s movies, like the faux-western stylings of “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance.” But listening to the original “Dansevise” I revised this idea, decided this is a fairly standard European pop of its day, a classy amalgam of light jazz, legit singing, and dinner-orchestra waltz stylings. A quick YouTube search of songwriter Otto Francker does make him seem a light jazz guy. (Turns out “Liberty Valance” is by a European too, Spanish songwriter Augusto Algueró.)

Also noticed, in comparing the two versions, how much Corry Brokken straightens out the rhythm. Each version feels very different, each good, the Grethe & Jørgen Ingmann having greater unsteadiness built into it.

koganbot

28 October 2023 14:46

The Lemons – Smooth. It flows nicely, and builds up. (Can you flow upwards?) The treated guitars scratch their way uphill at the end.

MC Yallah & Debmaster – This is all about its bumpiness, and it’s adept at hurdling and bumping and never losing its flow. So this one flows both up and down. [Sorry I didn’t have a fifth vote for it.]

Son of Mecha Mummy

28 October 2023 23:39

“Oh, right, I listened to the playlist for this a week ago and forgot to vote, I wonder if the poll is still open so I can give the whole thing another listen before picking my favorites!”
And then I checked in and saw there was twenty minutes left and just hastily threw votes at the ones I remember liking a lot, which were CENT and Deckadas. CENT in particular is wonderful, I really want to dig deeper on that one.

wpDiscuz

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koganbot on The League Of Extraordinary Tracks II: 7. BLACK POP HISTORY 1978-1981 – Polls12 March 2024
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vinnycrackers on The League Of Extraordinary Tracks II: 7. BLACK POP HISTORY 1978-1981 – Polls12 March 2024
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The League Of Extraordinary Tracks II: 1. NOT IN ENGLISH – Polls

The League Of Extraordinary Tracks II: 1. NOT IN ENGLISH – Playlists

The League Of Extraordinary Tracks II: 1. NOT IN ENGLISH – Results

The Discourse