Andy Cato and Tom Findlay, better known as Groove Armada, have announced a spring US. tour in support of Black Light, their sixth studio album through Om Records. The tour will find them dropping multiple dates in New York, California, and Florida, including appearances on Morning Becomes Electric and at the Ultra Music Festival in Miami.

Roxy Music / Re-Make Re-Model
A band that have had a great influence on us, particularly in the making of Black Light. Loads of Roxy tracks have been on loop on the tour bus, but this one stands out for me from their first ever eponymous album. It shows just how out there they really were.

Jonny Davis / Sliding Away
This is a killer house track that came out on Leeds’ brilliant 20:20 sometime last year. It’s not easy to combine vocals with a bubbling deep house tune, but this track does it nicely. Probably my favourite house track from last year.

Richie Havens / Back To My Roots
Once I heard this tune, nothing was the same again. I was always a bit of a rare groove merchant, then I heard Richie’s KILLER version of the Lamont Dozier classic, with rave pianos to the fore, and knew this was the future.

Delphic / Doubt (Riton remix)
Delphic Vs Riton, a match made in heaven. Delphic leading the nu charge of British dance music, and Henry Riton taking it to places others can’t reach.

Chic / I Want Your Love
I’ve been a big fan of disco for years, and Nile Rodgers and Bernard Edwards are key to the whole scene. They are the rhythm section and writers of all the Sister Sledge, and Chic’s music, and Diana Ross’ Upside Down. This is New York disco at its very best.

The Police / Voices Inside My Head
I grew up with this band, and it’s amazing what they produced in such a short space of time. This is one of their more esoteric tunes, and almost sounds like Talking Heads.

Friendly Fires / Skeleton Boy
Think Friendly Fires have been brilliant for dance music and moved it all forwards. I love the sound of the band, but alongside that whole garage vibe, they’ve got a way with an anthemic chorus. And this is right up there with Paris, for me.

The Rapture / House Of Jealous Lovers
I’ve always loved that angular New York sound. LCD Soundsystem is absolutely amazing, and these lot smashed it on their DFA label. These reminds of very good times.

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Sisterworld is the follow up to Liars‘ self-titled (2007) and was written and recorded in Los Angeles by Liars and Tom Biller (Kanye West, Beck). It’s the first Liars album to be recorded entirely in the US since 2004’s They Were Wrong, So We Drowned and sees Angus Andrew, Aaron Hemphill and Julian Gross taking inspiration from fringe characters lured to Los Angeles and the resulting subcultures and alternate spaces that they generate.

Clarence Carter / Patches
The more song-oriented Liars’ albums become, the more a song that tells a literal story like this seems the ultimate challenge to produce. For me, writing lyrics that are bare and clear with their meaning is such a scary thing. I have to try and overcome this fear anew with every song.

PJ Harvey / My Beautiful Leah
The low end rumble bass thing that slides slithers and bends its way through this song makes me want to marry it. I’ve loved that sound since I first heard this record more than ten years ago. Ever since, I feel like I’ve been trying to find that bass sound in the music I make but keep forgetting to actually do it.

Sightings / Tar And Pine
Sightings are one of my favorite active bands. As a band, Sightings have such a potent character that is so present in every album they make. I’m also blown away with Mark’s vocals on this album. They add subtle melody, and at times counter rhythm to the bass and percussion sounds.

Factory Floor / Wooden Box Tape
This is a new song by a new English band I like a lot. It reminds me of Underworld in its super lengthy slow build and blaze vocals. It’s really nice how the electronic drum and synth combine with the live drumming and guitar sounds.

The Legendary Pink Dots / Black Highway
I’m completely fascinated by The Legendary Pink Dots. Usually when I listen to music, there’s a large part of my brain focusing on the techniques and ideas, and how they relate to my approach to music. With the Legendary Pink Dots, they somehow suspend this preoccupation. They inspire me to be more free and spontaneous, all I hear is creativity in their music. I hear a release from self imposed structure, and a pure and simple connection with the flow of creativity.

Psychic TV / Just Drifting
Man, I could listen to this song forever. I get hypnotized by the lulling and looping vocal word play. Beautiful and tender with strings to match! But still, overall, this sense of lament, and I get the idea that everything isn’t quite as perfect and relaxing as it seems.

Gravediggaz / Diary Of A Madman
I don’t know about hip-hop nowadays, but I still love to listen to good lyricists. This song has such inventive and interesting word play all set on a super solid conceptual backdrop. It’s dark and fun and smart and possibly disturbing. if you let yourself go with it. I also love how it takes its title from the Gogol novel.

White Magic / One-Note
This song is from White Magic’s first EP, Through The Sun Door. The whole EP absolutely rules. Mira Billotte is one of my favorite singers around. The piano work is so crazy and beautiful. I never get tired of hearing this track. I wish White Magic would put out more records.

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Lyon-based Babylon Circus is music laced with ska, gypsy, rock, vaudevillian antics, dancehall and reggae. Their first Australian East Coast tour in 2008 saw the nine piece band sell every show out. They feature on the So Frenchy So Chic compilation and are touring Australia this March.

Django Reinhardt / Minor Swing
Backstage, home, in the bus, cooking or having breakfast, is there a time you wouldn’t love to hear this one? We love it anytime, any style, too, as it’s been remixed and rearranged so many different ways. Still, we love the original best.

Negresses Vertes / Zobi La Mouche
The one band we feel the closest to, touring the world, as we did in the late 80s, doing their own mix that sounds so French. The lyrics brings together the best that French can offer.

Gainsbourg / Aux Armes et Cætera
One of the greatest French singer-song writers ever recorded. This anti-war reggae version of the French national anthem brought both reggae and this provocative artist to light.

Teddybears Sthlm / Cobrastyle
This is the kind of party sound we like to hear. I never got the chance to see them live and couldn’t find much info about them, which is a pity.

Dub Pistols / Cyclone
Another great mix styles, definitely not as organic as the kind of traditional things we bring together. But they’re one of the bands that have influenced us lately as far as mixing influences goes.

The Streets / I Love You More
I’m not even sure that this is my favorite one on the album, but this special “kitsch” cheesy chorus, combined with his Birmingham accent, is worth listening to it. And I love it — more and more.

Rachid Taha / Rock el Casbah
A version of the legendary Clash song by French-Algerian, Rachid Taha. It has a very special taste of what North African youth are like these days. We like Rachid Taha and love the Clash for what we inherited from them. That’s enough to have it in the list.

Seeed / Top of the City
One of the best dancehall sounds comes from … Germany. They manage to make their language sound so good and their sound is so strong that they ended producing lot of tracks for Jamaican artists. Can you believe it!

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Stalwarts of the Chicago music scene, The J. Davis Trio’s latest album, These Things Happen, features their ever evolving blend of hip hop and garage-jazz with big beats. The band is known for their crisp performances and has shared stages with The Roots, M’shelle N’degleocello, Ozomatli, Reuben Wilson, De La Soul, Maceo Parker, Norah Jones, and many others.

Marlena Shaw / California Soul
Just a great example of a beautifully crafted classic soul song. A masterful balance of big band and intimate soulful expression.

Dr. Buzzard and the Original Savannah Band / Soraya-March of the Nignies
This whole album has a special place in my heart. The entire recording is a triumph of amazing songwriting and recording techniques light years ahead of its time. It’s a seamless fusion of soul, Creole, dixieland, disco, jazz, tropical, and something delicious that no one else can figure out.

Slum Village / Closer
Masters of the slow, richly produced booty moving music. Wizards of sound texture.

Xzibit & Dr. Dre / Get Fucked Up With Me
Every once and awhile, Dre makes a track so ill you just scratch your head. This is one of those tracks. Ear-bending bassline, classic Dre upper register keys, evil percussion and a perfect complementary beat.

David Byrne / Strange Overtones
Another studio marvel. A fun song that makes you ask, ‘how did he do that?’

eMC / We Alright
Hip hop super-group eMC spread cohesive, linear, thoughtful rhymes over a beat with a tight swing. Featuring a rapper who, in my opinion, embodies East Coast hip hop, Masta Ace.

Robert Plant / In The Mood
Great mix of dreamy blues-rock with a strong backbeat. As well as just being a great song, it was one the first videos to feature high-level breakdancing, which meant a lot to up and coming hip hoppers.

Q-Tip featuring D’Angelo / Believe
One of my favorite rappers returns on this neo-soul track. The rich, multiple mid-layers are woven seamlessly with a classic hip hop beat.

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The power of Afrobeat, sizzling funk, righteous hip hop, rootsy grooves and 20 of the hottest musicians from Melbourne’s booming music scene, all come together on the sublime debut by The Public Opinion Afro Orchestra. Hot on the heels of their impeccable vinyl-only release Two Sides of the Truth/Do Anything Go Anywhere, The Public Opinion Afro Orchestra have made an album to command the attention of world music fans, hip hop aficionados, jazz cats, funk and soul freaks and indie hipsters alike.

Fela Kuti / Shakara
For a band playing Afro-beat, it’s impossible to not cite Fela as a chief inspiration. A giant in both the musical and political arenas, Fela IS afro-beat. Taking musical cues from American funk, jazz and traditional African rhythms, he created his own style, his own way and created music that was felt across the world. It’s a big call, but I think this is my favourite Fela track: a bit dark, but it’s still a mover.

William Onyeabor / Better Change Your Mind
This is a record that I picked up on our recent mission to Lagos, Nigeria. One glance at the cover and you know this is going to be a killer: William, himself, in front of an array of crazy old keyboards, nine microphones pointed towards him and the words ‘ATOMIC BOMB’ bursting out from around his head. I love the drums and the way pulsating guitar line draws you into that trance-like state the way only good African music can.

Les Volcans De La Capital / Oyaka Jojo
It wasn’t just Nigeria where this music was taking hold, all through West Africa good funky music was popping up in the 70s. This is another gem of a 45 dug up on my travels, having made it’s way across the border from Benin. The two things that really stand out on this record are the honky horn arrangements and the relationship between the drums and percussion in African records of the time. You can almost hear the engineer calling out ‘More shekere!’, as he turns the snare waaay down.

Buari / Advice From Father
Nice bit of mid-70s Ghanian disco-funk from our man Sidiku Buari. He was a band leader and halftime entertainer at soccer matches in Accra before moving to the US and recording a couple of records, this being his second. Featuring the legendary Bernard Purdie on drums and a bubbling, bouncing bass line, this one is strictly for the dancers!

Ty (feat. Tony Allen) / The Willing
Fela’s longtime drummer and collaborator, Tony Allen, has always been one to branch out and work with artists with a myriad of backgrounds and sounds. This is probably my favourite collaboration of his, though, teaming up with Ty (a London based MC originally from Nigeria) who I’ve always been a real fan of. For me, this was the first real demonstration of how well the hip-hop/Afro-beat thing can work and it left me wanting more.

Pete Rock & CL Smooth / T.R.O.Y.
We are all big fans of hip-hop and this is a deserved all-time classic – you just can’t mess with Pete Rock as a producer. The thing that really stands out in all his beats to me is his signature horn sound, and in this song, I love the way the vocals interact with and play off the horn loop, not dissimilar to Fela at times. With a five-piece horn section (and a master arranger, Tristan Ludowyk), brass will always play a big part in our band, as indeed it does it most Afro-beat music.

Red / I Should Tell Your Momma On Ya
This record only came out last year and it’s a pretty crazy one! Red, a homeless man from the streets of L.A and self-proclaimed G-Funk beatboxer, performs the song, which consists of him beatboxing and singing at the same time. I guess this couldn’t count as a direct influence, but I really admire the spirit of this song and it’s really a stunning performance, regardless of whether of not you actually dig the music. Which, incidentally, I dig the hell out of.

Terry Callier / You’re Going To Miss Your Candyman
A bloody beautiful song. From the greasy bass line and full percussion, to the soaring vocal workout, this is ‘folk-funk’ at its best. I found this in New York in a basement at the bottom of a bunch of old country records, but it has never strayed far from the front of my record crate since.

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There’s something about the kind of potent rock and roll fury that Airbourne cranks out, all cylinders firing, that makes you want to chug a beer straight down your throat and punch the air as though it’d touched your wife inappropriately. It sounds crude, we admit. But that’s the thing about these Aussie pub rock rebels. Their music, like new album No Guts. No Glory., are perfect soundtracks for drunken debauchery, and “that’s what we’re here for, mate,” says rowdy lead guitarist and vocalist Joel O’Keeffe.

Charlie Daniels Band / The Devil Went Down To Georgia
It has an awesome story and even more amazing fiddle playing. For a country song, it ROCKS!

Metallica / Disposable Heroes
This song has everything a good Metallica song should have: epic chorus, thrash as fuck!

Iron Maiden / Hallowed Be Thy Name
Some of the best riffs Maiden ever had are in this song and they’ve had so many good riffs.

Kreator / Hoards of Chaos
80s thrash band that released their best album last year. This is the title track.

AC/DC / For Those About To Rock
This is AC/DC’s most epic song. It’s just awesome.

Bruce Springsteen / Born In The USA
One word, EPIC!

Metallica / Battery
So thrash, so fuckin’ rad.

AC/DC / Riff Raff
Old school AC/DC? Gotta love it!

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Gardening From The Ground Up Part 1 is Houston native Sarah Elizabeth Foster’s first collection of deeply charged tunes. Filled with raw emotion and wistful reflection, her songs are the product of a vision almost stalled when she was challenged to persevere through the intensive vocal therapy necessary to arrive at what her doctors called a “miraculous recovery” when she was diagnosed with a benign, vocal chord polyp. The record is an unusual acoustic blend of 60s inspired pop, fresh folk and classical motifs wrapped around Sarah’s deep vocals and emotionally rich lyrics.

Joni Mitchell / Both Sides Now
The orchestral arrangement of Both Sides Now is so moving, paired with Joni Mitchell’s voice. The intro starts so perfectly and quietly then you immediately grasp her life experience the second you hear her voice. At the 2:40, mark when the horns come in, I always feel my heart swell.

Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake / Act I: 9.Finale
There is nothing more romantic than this melodic theme. Tchaikovsky is a genius and listening to the music can somehow give me the exact same sensation as being whisked into the air and balanced with my arms outstretched like a swan.

Petula Clark / Tout Ce Que Veut Lola (Whatever Lola Wants)
Whatever Lola Wants reins as one of the sexiest songs in existence, and to have it made even sexier in French is just beyond words. Fantastic.

Tim McGraw / Still
‘There’s a place I like to go, where I can hear the cotton grow’. This is the first lyric of the song and it immediately brought on a memory for me that I had totally forgotten about. When I was living in Corpus Christi as a kid, my parents would take my brother and I out to the cotton fields to pick cotton off the side of the road. I loved seeing how the plant grew and then pick the cotton. When I got home, I would sit for hours picking out the seeds. Not only do I love this song because of these memories I have, but the sentiment from the rest of the song is so powerful. No matter how crazy your life is, you can go back to those happy memories by just closing your eyes and being still.

Doris Day / Toyland
Although Christmas is long over, I’m still listening to one of my favorite Christmas songs. Toyland transports you to a magical fantasy-land of comfort, warmth, toys, pajamas, and fun, it just makes me imagine the perfect Christmas morning. Doris Day’s voice is sweet, slow, and sincere. It’s reflective and relaxing, everything Christmas represents to me.

Caetano Veloso, Gal Costa / Baby
I seriously listen to this song on the edge of my seat waiting to hear her sing, ‘baby, baby’. So PERFECT! Maybe it’s the accent, but you just have to listen, I can’t explain it. Okay, maybe I can explain it, it’s like getting a neck massage.

Tété / L’envie et la dédain
I accidentally stumbled upon this song and have been enjoying this artist’s music ever since. It’s current French Pop/Rock/R&B, all the things I love and his voice is great. Really soulful.

The Lonely Island, T-Pain / I’m on a Boat
Guilty pleasure! Disclaimer: There’s a lot of profanity in this song! It reminds me of the Hip-Hop I grew up with, combined with the hilarity of a boat. Who knew boats were so funny? My favorite lyric that I sing around the house all the time is ‘never thought I’d be on a boat’.

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Magichour, the self-titled debut release from acclaimed songwriting duo Ian Housten Shadwell and Gemma Deacon is an intricate tapestry of sounds wrapped into dreamy pop songs. Gemma and Ian are best known as the songwriting team behind iconic Sydney acoustic pop classicists, Cactus Child.

Magnet / Where happiness Lives
I have always had a deeply sentimental side, the kind of cloying cry in the movies kind of girliness that has marked me as a soft cock lover of the acoustic ballad, and they don’t come anywhere softer or more ballad like than this fingerpicked folk paen to a lost love. It became the soundtrack for a particularly difficult break up in which I would press replay with a Pavlovian frequency, each time feeling the tears well in my eyes with a delicious sadness. My own instincts aside and I can recommend it you as a very pretty song indeed by someone who I think is more or less unknown outside of his native Denmark.

Pilot / January
One of the greatest pop songs of all time, with an irresistible melody, a sublimely catchy guitar hook, throwaway lyrics with rhymes in all the right places, and a film clip that is suffused with that special glowing light that only seemed to exist in the seventies. It is the archetypical pop song with an ABABCABC structure and the kind of disco rock beat that underpinned so many of the hits of the period. I wouldn’t be surprised to hear that they are a Phoenix favorite.

Buffalo Springfield / Mr Soul
My affection for Neil Young borders on the obssesive, so whilst there are a score of his tunes that I would recommend with the kind of wild eyed enthusiasm that makes people back away, this track — Mr Soul from Buffalo Springfield ‚ is both extraordinarily charismatic and wilfuly weird enough to capture those two aspects of Young’s talent that have elevated him above the vagaries of contemporary taste and turned him into an ageless hero of pop music. Listen particularly for the wild electric guitar solo, the delicious nasal twang that went on to define his career and the “edgy” LA tripped out lyrics which presaged the souring American dream Hunter S Thompson would devote his life to.

Kyle Minogue/ Can’t Get You Out of My Head
As a writer, there have been times in my life, under the various strictures that a record company can impress upon a young musician not yet fully formed, in which I have been consumed with the desire to write a radio hit. This song, is to me, the greatest example of the genre that I can think of. From its, cynical lyrical refrain, with its evil suggestion, to the ultra slick disco beat there is nothin gin this tune that is in excess of its prime directive — which is to be catchy. It is the Platonic ideal of the radio song — irresistible, undemanding, insistently dancable and more or less unforgettable, whilst being completely unmemorable. A zeitgeist classic, which I could never recommend.

The Spinto Band / Oh Mandy
I don’t know another song that this band has done, nor anything about them. But this song is a cracker, with its falsetto chorus, frenetic mandolin, rocking groove and general pop rock mayhem. It is an affirmation of everything that is so fucking good about pop music — the bittersweet longing, the straight eight groove, the three note tune, the imbecilic chorus. Its a litmus test of pop authenticity in which the yearning is turned into yelling, but in a very high voice. Sweet, delicate, dumb, lovely.

Elton John / Goodbye Yellow Brick Road
The first album I ever bought was Moog classics. My second was Elton John’s Greatest Hits. This was a golden period in Elton and Bernie Taupin’s writing in which they seemed incapable of writing a poor song. Goodbye Yellow Brick Road was up there with some of his best. It has a great lyric, a sophisticated melody, an extraordinary arrangement, beautiful orchestration and is soaked in reverb. What more could you want? How about the Muppets? Too, too sweet.

David Bowie / Boys Keep Swinging
I could easily have chosen eight songs from Bowie’s ouvre alone, as he is quite simply the best artist that pop music has produced – and that includes the Beatles. But in the end, I avoided the more obvious contenders and went for his fucked up late Berlin work, which includes classics like DJ or Look Back in Anger. This stuff still sounds cutting edge contemporary and yet is wildly singable – indeed, perfect for Karaoke — whilst predicting just about every contemporary music trend there ever has been or ever will be. I’m still not sure what went wrong after The China Girl album.

Sweet / Ballroom Blitz
I am obsessed with men that wear eyeshadow. And when it comes to wearing eyeshadow, no one beats the Sweet. Indeed, when it comes down to it, no one beats them in terms of wearing tight bespangled spandex, or high heeled boots or hairsprayed long hair. These boys were hair metal before Vince Neil had even bought a hairdryer. This song is so thoroughly soaked in awesome, from its drum rolling intro and the call and response of the band, right down to the squeals of the chorus and the kicking solo. It is a rock and roll ideal. A call to action. Cheap, glamorous and delightful.

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Mean Everything To Nothing is the second album from Atlanta’s Manchester Orchestra. It’s everything you want a rock record to be: raw, urgent, emotional, and 100 percent authentic: ‘There is nothing fake about this record’, says frontman and lyricist, Andy Hull. ‘There’s not one fake sound on it. We recorded it live because we wanted it to sound like a band, and I think it does: live and loud!’

Neil Young / Revolution Blues
From On The Beach, this song totally wraps your body in its groove. And the lyrics are stellar: ‘I hear that Laurel Canyon is filled with famous stars but I hate them worse than leppers and I’ll kill them in their cars’.

Atmosphere / Trying To Find A Balance
Most reliable tour song I’ve ever heard.

Drake / I Just Want To Be Successful
Love this guy, and whatever he has going on, I back it. Great flow, great lyrics, great beats.

Mos Def / The Eccentric
I just got this record yesterday. I always forget how good Mos Def is on the mic due to how great he is on the screen.

Neil Young / I’m The Ocean
Totally incredible song from the 1995 Neil Young and Pearl Jam album, Mirror Ball; Brendan O’Brien produced. Awesome.

David Bazan / Bless This Mess
Incredible tune from his first full length album, Curse Your Branches. I’ve been a Pedro The Lion fan for years, but in my opinion, this is his best work to date.

Built To Spill / You Are
Classic Built To Spill. Insanely harmonious instruments on top of one simple line that stretches throughout the song but leaves more questions in this one lyric than most can with one tune.

Neil Young / Walk On
First track from On The Beach: ‘Oh baby, that’s hard to change, they don’t know just how to feel, some get stoned and some get strange but sooner or later it all gets real, walk on’.

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One of the Australia’s most talented, technically proficient and versatile DJs/producers. Sampology will be bringing his Super Visual Smackdown show to the upcoming BACARDI EXPRESS concerts, a cutting edge A/V show that chops and cuts both audio and video in perfect harmony over the speakers and onto screens.

Boney M / Ma Baker
Simply a track I will never get sick of. I can’t get enough of the groove on this one sampled by The Avalanches for Live at Dominoes. I have always had a bit of an obsession with tracks other people have sampled. Some might call it a dedication to music, I just think I’m a geek. The film clip is ace, as well.

Staygold / Backseat (ft. Spank Rock, Damien Adore & Lady Tigra)
I only heard this one a few days ago. It’s one of those tracks that will no doubt work in a lot of situations because there is something for everybody here. The arrangement is great and the track doesn’t complicate itself, even though there are a bunch of different talents in the mix. Spank Rock should keep rapping on more stuff like this.

Nas & Damian Marley / As We Enter
Nas is one of the most prolific rappers of all time. My beef with him is that he is sometimes pretty whack at picking beats, that’s why when I heard this new joint from him, it made me so happy. I hope the rest of the Nas and Damian Marley album is as solid as this. Sidenote for the nerds, sample was taken from Mulatu Astataque, Yegelle Tezeta.

Stevie Wonder / A Place in The Sun
Hands down, my favourite vocalist of all time. I picked this track because it shows off his skills amazingly well. It’s also a pretty uplifting and inspiring song. I was lucky enough to see Stevie live in 2009, and it was one of the most intense experiences of my life!

Tame Impala / Remember Me
I’m pretty sure these guys are from Perth, even though I think someone told me they were from Byron Bay? Admittedly (and obviously), I don’t know a whole lot about them, but I picked up their track Remember Me, which Modular put out as a picture disc 7”, and loved it. The fact that it’s a cover of a 90s Hip-Hop, big beat anthem and its 60s inspired production makes it such a winner.

Sugarhill Gang / Apache
Everybody loves this track if they are in the mood to party. If you don’t, I straight up don’t believe you. It’s one of those tracks that I probably know most of the words of. It’s real fun to juggle to. Jump on it!

The Pigs / Single Ladies (Put A Ring On It)
Ok, so this is a cover version of the Beyonce song by a Country and Western band. Need I say any more? I do? Well, in the right situation, such as 2:30am in a trashy twisted party, if you drop this, it’s very entertaining watching people’s confusion and excitement and trying to remember barn dancing moves they were taught in primary school.

Barrington Levy / Here I Come
This is one of my favourite reggae/dancehall tracks. Its stabbing rhythm, combined with the soulful chords, make it such an awesome piece of music. I can also never get enough of the ’shideli-wadeli-dideli-who-o-oaaa’.

Sampology is onboard the 2010 BACARDI EXPRESS. Check out www.bacardiexpress.com.au for more details.

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