Quotes and Reactions to Mbira Post

-  Jamie Catto, One Giant Leap (London) - “I love it… I hope you’ll come and play a live show with us”

-  Bob Duskis, Six Degrees Records (San Francisco) - “…it remains one of my favourite submissions ever”

-  KCRW (Los Angeles) - “buy this CD”

-  BBC Radio 3’s Late Junction (London) - “…it has the qualities that all the best records have, superb”

-  Nicky Blumenfeld, Kaya FM (Johannesburg) - “such originality, it’s a beautiful album”

-  Putumayo World Records (New York) - “loving the album! Some real beauties on there!”

-  Andy Ross, AR Management (Santa Monica) - “I really love your album.  I mean really love your album”

-  Peter Prukl, Curious Pictures (Johannesburg) - “Awesome!”

Mbira Post by blissful virtuous is a truly original work, blessed and influenced by the past.  It is a massive journey of sounds, sessions and searching.  With its roots in Zimbabwe, recordings and mixes have happened worldwide from Borneo to the UK, Tanzania to the US, and Swaziland to Thailand.

When we finished Mbira Post it was eagerly passed from hand to hand throughout the industry, from those who’d discovered it to those who’d been told that they simply needed to hear it, always with the enthusiasm of a fanatic, no one copy ever staying with its owner for too long or remaining un-ripped for a friend.  Copies have made it to the far corners of the world leaving a trail of people who love the blissful virtuous sound.

We’ve decide that we’re going to look for a label to help us get Mbira Post out to a wider audience, so please drop us a line if you like what we’re up to and think you can help - we’d love to talk about working together.

The Story Of the Traditional Music Of Swaziland album

This is a wonderful album of indigenous Swazi music, instruments and performers, recorded and produced by Mark and Roo.  It’s led to some great opportunities for the performers involved, including generating income through the sale of this album.  We make sure that money raised from the project goes back to everyone that played on this album and we’re currently working hard to get this album released on a larger scale.

After the buzz about Mbira Post we started to get a lot of offers of tours and projects and we took up many of the offers, but one of them really stood out.  ‘Alliance Franciasé’ commissioned us to record and document the indigenous music and sounds of Swaziland so we spent a few weeks wandering around Swaziland with backpacks filled with recording gear and eventually set up studio in the music department of Waterford Kamhlaba school up in Mbabane.  Many people walked from miles around to come to play for us and record at our makeshift studio and we’ve got photo’s or video of everyone who was involved in this incredible project, as well as some amazing images of our time sourcing ideas and recordings in preparation for album 2. Take a look at them all here.

This is not a blissful virtuous album, it’s a collection of Swazi players playing traditional songs on indigenous Swazi instruments in their own land - we were lucky enough to be asked to record and produce it!

Our Production Music & Commissioned Music...

is available from many different places.  We write and remix new and old bv works for Juice Music, EMI & ITV, and you can find much of it on KPM’s web site.  We’ve written theme’s and soundtracks for movies, idents for new BBC channels and continue to work on production & library music if and when we get the opportunity.

Dreams Of Africa - An unfinished work but worthy of a mention due to the efforts of everyone involved.  This project started from a discussion between blissful v and Jamie Catto of One Giant Leap where we decided that we’d put together an upbeat ‘summer feel’ track.  It’s a beautiful track and I’m sure we’ll post it here as soon as it’s in a fit state.

The Long And Winding Road - We provided the music for Michael Pinchbeck’s four-year long art project about his experience of loss, memory, mourning and recovery.  Check out Michael's work, and go meet him on the journey while you can.

Exotic Chill - One of Juice Music’s first ever releases on which the blissful sound featured heavily.

Drop us an email if you have a project that’s in need of some rather cool tunes with a blissful twist.

Album 2...

Album 2 remains as yet untitled but we’re pretty sure that the lead track is going to be ‘Starting Over’.  It’s a barrage of repetition, growing and pushing onwards, with driving mbira racing with the electronics.  We’re not sure who wins.  Mbulusi/Pinnacles is a piece straight from Mark that could tear your little heart out - I’m working on some beats and some sweet sounds to complete the bv circle on that one.

We’ve got a great piece that I’ve been working on with vocals from Simon Wainwright from Hope&Social - it’s pretty chilling at times and looks like it’s going to be called Rattling.  Me n Mark worked on it last time he was in the UK and we’re real happy with how it’s coming on.  We’ve started to think about the links for tracks and about pulling in more of the stuff we recorded in Swaziland back in 2005.

Keep checking back - there will be new tracks up here soon and we’ll be looking for feedback from you guys!