"ten ni todokisô ni kakeagaru no kono omoi / sen no nami haruka ni yume yori tooku made yukô"

I have a mild difficulties with spoken word recognition. In person, where there's social cues, it's only sometimes an issue, though I still occasionally guess wrong. But it does mean I have to listen several times to a song in English to figure out what it's about, unless the singer is enunciating especially clearly. Songs in other languages, no matter how fluent I might be, I need to read the lyrics to have a clue.

All by way of justifying why I included Spanish on this mix of songs I don't know* what they're about:

Wakaranai ga, Suki da. ("I don't understand, but I like it.")

01 / "Ponta de Lanca Africano (Umbabarauma)" / Jorge Ben Jor
02 / "Dil Vich Lagya Ve" / Chup Chup Ke soundtrack
03 / "Äppelknyckarjazz" / Movits!
04 / "Hanjûryoku Ryokô (反重力旅行)" / Capsule
05 / "Toc-Toc-Toc" / Kitty Hoff & Forêt-Noire
06 / "Epoca" / Gotan Project
07 / "J'étais Là" / Zazie
08 / "Jigeum Naui Nolaega Deullindamyeon (지금 나의 노래가 들린다면)" / Peppertones
09 / "Tiempo y Silencio" / Cesária Évora & Pedro Guerra
10 / "Vivre" / Zap Mama
11 / "Meli Meli" / Cheb Mami
12 / "Tím, čím chcete" / Gipsy
13 / "Sælugaukur" / Krauka
14 / "Grita" / Jarabe de Palo
15 / "Mundo" / Sporto Kantes
16 / "Rainha" / Céu
17 / "Nosotra Vida" / José Saavedra
18 / "Kin no Nami, Sen no Nami (金の波 千の波)" / Akino Arai
19 / "Zhǎo Zì Jǐ (找自己)" / David Tao
20 / "Hakol Kashura" / Habanot Nechama
21 / "Ekibobo" / Samite

Download available here until the link expires in a week.

Reflecting what I have on hand, Spanish, French, and Portuguese are over-represented (I've even more Brazilian pop than I thought, and enough tasty songs in French to fill a mix with just that), while eastern Europe and western + central Asia are under-represented. Interestingly, three of the four African artists live and perform in the European power that colonized their home country (the Ugandan instead went to the United States). Also, not allowing random bits of English lyrics rules out a lot of K-pop, or at least the sort K-pop I seem to end up with. All titles romanized because my version of WinZip can't cope with high ASCII in file names.** This time the local artist is José Saavedra again (Batucaxé having not made the final cut).

For your amusement, the music videos for "J'étais Là" and "Zhǎo Zì Jǐ," and the joyous and spectacular movie scene for "Dil Vich Lagya Ve."

* Not counting, yanno, Googling lyrics and/or videos. As one does.

** Speaking of which, the Peppertones title is romanized by Google -- no guarantees for accuracy.

---L.