The Occurrence

French, Latin and Pygmy influences make up the structure of Central African Republic's music scene. Dulcet sounds are hammered out on the balafon, a xylophone relative made from animal horns and skin. Dances borrow from the cha-cha and merengue, kicking...

  Releasing an album full of covers is almost a rite of passage in the music world. Some groups have built entire careers off reinterpreting classics (Vitamin String Quartet, for example). Dustin Kensrue of screamo staples...

To be honest, we’d never heard of Cape Verde (now Cabo Verde) before this feature. But its history is intriguing. Largely uninhabited until the 15th Century, the archipelago west of Senegal became a Portuguese hub...

Cocofunka call their new album Chúcaro, or “wild” in English. Twelve untamed tracks embrace Costa Rica’s native sounds of soca – a rhythmic calypso style – along with four-on-the-floor post-punk and ’80s pop. The album’s eponymous...

O Canada! To narrow down the massive number of gifted artists from the North American nation to just five is daunting. From the prog-fathers Rush to hip-hop heartthrob Drake, to the legendary Neil Young and...

The allure of music is universal, as we’ve witnessed with our Occur Goes Global series. Also universal? Older generations decrying their descendants’ art as vulgar rubbish. The Cameroon Tribune reported on elder culturists in the...

"Fear not the future, weep not for the past." goes a Khmer proverb. It’s a motto widely adopted by today’s Cambodians, who are reaffirming their identities and embracing the sounds that shaped their history. During...

Can one survive an EDM concert sober?   With its flickering strobes, oculus rifts, subwoofer earthquakes, underdressed under-aged throngs and haze of PLUR penetrating the soul, you might think not. The atmosphere is noisy and sweaty, with...