Ojos de Brujo
This is what I found while listening to Radio Netscape the other day - a great contemporary band called Ojos de Brujo. Their homepage doesn’t seem to work, but you can find a nice interview of theirs here. The music is really mixed, but mainly as they say, flamenco and hip-hop. They’ve got all the tricks of arrangement done really nicely, lots of band dynamics and simply mindblowing use of voices. Although this is probably not going to be my favourite band of all time, their album is certainly instructive in terms of their approach to songwriting and arranging. And of course, their sound is wonderful and should be good for many weeks of joyful listening.
I bought their album “Bari” from iTunes, but I suppose it should be available on most major emusic sites.