What's on the CD with the September issue.

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1. Roots Manuva - Do Nah Bodda Mi
"Shit has changed," says Mr Manuva, "but the hunger is still here. I made it clear years ago I pride myself on being mutant fusion and it is such a blessing to hear similar sentiments from other artists. I hate the tag UK hip hop but I have true respect for artists new, old, established and less that have paved the way and keep on doing so." That's from his website, where either the calendar is wrong or he's posting this from the future! In whichever case, belting record.
From the CD Slime & Reason

2. Ry Cooder - Drive Like I Never Been Hurt
"This album is the coolest thing Uncle Ry's done in years," said Charles Shaar Murray in these pages just recently, "and with a track record like his, this is praise not given lightly. It's affecting, thought-provoking, exhilarating and - most important of all - big, big fun." Of this track he said, "This is like something Bruce Springsteen may have heard in his head when he was young."
From the CD I, Flathead

3. She & Him - This Is Not A Test
"She" is actress Zooey Deschanel while "him" is multi-instrumentalist M Ward. The two of them "keep in their hearts the records that most DJs aren't playing any more: Les Paul & Mary Ford, The Ronettes, Nina Simone, Chet Atkins, The Carter Family and about a hundred others", and their objective is to get some of the warmth and charm of records from the early part of the last century into the music of today. This is a remarkably good stab.
From the CD Volume 1

4. Randy Newman - Potholes
One of the prices of being related to a genuinely creative artist is that from time to time you may find yourself and your personal relationships rowed into the plot of a song. Newman has not flinched in the past when it comes to writing about his marriage, his family and even his re-marriage, and he isn't afraid to make himself the villain of the piece. This brilliant song about the distorting effects of nostalgia features his father talking about him in unflattering terms to his second wife.

From the CD Harps And Angels

5. Manu Chau - Mr Bobby
Manu Chao enjoys the sort of reputation in the non-Anglophone world that his hero Bob Marley enjoyed in the so-called Third World. This song was written in praise of Marley and first appeared on Manu's 2001 breakthrough album, which has just been reissued. This version comes from the accompanying live album, which takes its name from the bush telegraph employed by Fidel Castro's army during the Cuban Revolution.
From the CD Radio Bemba Sound System

6. Chatham County Line - Chip Of A Star
Raleigh, North Carolina is a city far enough south to have spawned many acts with some of that region's pastoral sensibility in their music but close enough to New York to have some of that northern hurry-up as well. CCL's fourth album is produced by former dB Chris Stamey, a Raleigh legend himself. "We started the band as a way to hang out and drink beer," they confess. "Slowly it turns into a career. This record is about growing up and becoming a band."

From the CD IV

7. The Grouch - Watch Watch (featuring Mike Marshall)
The Grouch is a member of the Living Legends, a loose assembly of Bay Area MCs who would probably place themselves on the more "responsible" flank of the genre. The Grouch records in his own right but this is his first solo record in five years.
From the CD Show You The World

8. Da Cruz - Maria
Mariana Da Cruz is a Brazilian singer with a background in bossa nova who has performed in the clubs of Sao Paolo and Portugal and has ended up working with producer Ane H, from which experience electronic music has entered the mix along with traditional Portuguese fado music. "Transglobal, electro-acoustic pop with a Brazilian soul and a heartbeat as precise as a Swiss clockwork," they call it. "And if you listen well, you even hear some Swiss cowbells in the background."
From the Nova Estacao

9. John Metcalfe - The Shock Of Recognition
A New Zealander who ended up in Manchester as a member of the Durutti Column, John Metcalfe was the classically trained enthusiast behind Factory Records' attempts to start a classical label and is now the string arranger that they (including Morrissey and Chrissie Hynde) ask for by name. This comes from his third solo record.
From the CD A Darker Sunset

10. James McMurtry - God Bless America (pat mAcdonald Must Die)
Every dog has his day. McMurtry has been making albums since 1989 but only in the declining years of the George Bush presidency has his sardonic and angry voice begun to find its mark. For anyone wondering why petrol prices are so high, this song could serve as an economics lesson. The curiously spelled mAcdonald is a musician friend of the author, so we can assume that is a private joke.
From the CD Just Us Kids

11. Our Broken Gardening - Anchoring
From Rob Fitzpatrick's home for beautiful Scandinavian girls with complex personal lives and a strong line in melancholy comes Anna Bronsted, who is Our Broken Garden. Why they can never call themselves "The Poptops" or something is a mystery to me. Anna is signed to Bella Union, which is run by Simon Raymond and Robin Guthrie
of Cocteau Twins fame. This seems to make sense.
From the CD When Your Blackening Shows

12. Kasai All Stars - Quick As White
Africa is not one country. The Congo is not even a nation as we would understand it. Kasai All Stars bring together musicians from the many different linguistic and cultural traditions covered by that vast territory. They're a collective of 25 musicians who slim down to a comparatively manageable 14 when they're touring. It will be a good year if anyone comes up with a title to beat this one.
From the CD In The 7th Moon, The Chief Turned Into A Swimming Fish And Ate The Head Of His Enemy By Magic

13. Teddy Thompson - One Of These Days
Believe it or not this is Teddy's fourth album and resumes the previous direction of his career following his collection of reworked country classics. Thanks to the production of Marius De Vries, it's his most finished-sounding to date. Teddy gives credit where it's due: "I could tell him that I wanted something to sound like fairies dancing around a maypole and he'd know what button to push to get that."
From the CD A Piece Of What You Need

14. Gotye - Coming Back
It's pronounced "gore-ti-yeah" in Australian English. Although Wouter DeBacker was born in Belgium, he grew up in Melbourne and has played in bands like The Downstares and The Basics but has attracted more attention making records on his own. As in this case, his songs combine sophisticated production, imaginative use of the spoken interlude and that Balkan trumpet that everyone is going crazy for nowadays.
From the CD Like Drawing Blood

15. Horace Silver - Doodlin'
The recent discussion about good buys in jazz at www.wordmagazine.co.uk encouraged the belief that the citizenry might enjoy this 1955 recording of Horace Silver with the early Jazz Messengers. It comes from an excellent series of double-CD themed reissues of 1950s jazz from Blue Note. It also marks the first time we've featured a drum solo on any Now Hear This! collection but it is played by Art Blakey, so that's OK.
From the CD New York Is Our Home