The B-52's, 'Funplex' (Astralwerks)
SHARE THIS:
Mlle Caro and Franck Garcia, 'Pain Disappears' (Buzzin' Fly)
For the past few years, minimal German dance music, with its fierce emptiness and slim rhythms, has been a scene with untapped crossover potential. And Mlle Caro, DJ at Paris' renowned house-music club Rex, and Franck Garcia, a producer/DJ based in the south of France, take advantage of the hypnotic genre's possibilities.
SHARE THIS:
James Murphy & Pat Mahoney, 'Fabriclive 36' (Fabric)
SHARE THIS:
The Black Swans, 'Change!' (La Société Expéditionnaire)
"All of my people think I look strange," confesses singer/songwriter/ guitarist/producer Jerry DeCicca with an inscrutable weariness, on "New Face," one of 12 unhurried folk ballads on this Ohio band's second album.
SHARE THIS:
Axe Riverboy, 'Tutu to Tango' (Minty Fresh)
French pop rockers tend to have an effortless melodic gift, and that's the case with Xavier Boyer, leader of Parisian group Tahiti 80.
SHARE THIS:
Booka Shade, 'DJ-Kicks' (!K7)
The Berlin-based duo of Arno Kammermeier and Walter Merziger up the sonic intrigue on tracks by Heaven 17, Aphex Twin, Carl Craig, the Tubes (!), and others with their gospeldeep, elegantly wood-toned beats.



