SA DINGDING 

“Alive” 

(Wrasse) 

The carefully designed mystery of Sa Dingding’s “Alive” is literally impenetrable in spots. Even the multi-linguists who speak three of the languages she uses on the release (Chinese, Tibetan and Sanskrit) won’t understand the tracks “Oldster by the Xilin River” and “Lagu Lagu” because Dingding is using a language of her own creation.

Dead Can Dance’s Lisa Gerrard has been famously successful at making up words for songs, and it also works for Dingding within the rewarding blend of organic world music and machine-made mysticism.

“Alive,” like the singer herself, is a composite of various cultures in China. Heavy, resonant drumming and electronic rhythms polish up the atmosphere of indigenous instruments to something akin to ‘90s acts Enigma and Deep Forest — and Dingding’s little-girl voice even sounds somewhat like the vocal on Deep Forest’s hit “Sweet Lullaby.”

Some might prefer a more authentic experience than this, especially when the proceedings take a corny, synthetic turn such as the moment the ballad “Tuo Luo Ni” blows up into an unseemly dance track.

Still, the album’s overall effect is mesmerizing, with Dingding’s voice seducing in the lounge-ish vibe of “Flickering With Blossoms,” dovetailing into a soothing tandem with vocalist Huo Yonggang on a Tibetan version of “Holy Incense” and expressively driving the cinematic changes of “Mama Tian Na.”

And you don’t have to understand a single word to feel the otherworldly power.

¥ 

PETER SALETT

“In the Ocean of the Stars” 

(Dusty Shoes) 

Perhaps you don’t recognize the name Peter Salett, but if you saw the movie “Forgetting Sarah Marshall,” you’re familiar with some of his work.

(Spoiler alert for those who haven’t seen the comedy ...)

Near the end of the movie, the protagonist fulfills his dream of staging “Taste for Love,” a puppet musical about Dracula. Salett — along with writer/star Jason Segel — wrote the musical’s humorous, and still somehow touching, finale.

If that rings a bell or simply sounds good, don’t be in a rush to buy Salett’s “In the Ocean of the Stars” just yet.

The new release is more conventional singer-songwriter stuff: no dying vampires with pregnant lovers. Salett does hit a few supernatural notes, starting with the gossamer blend of faint strings, soft piano and delicate vocals on opener “Magic Hour,” but in general the performer merely brushes on the surreal.

He’s on target with the gorgeous string-soaked textures of the sweeping title track, the soothing simplicity of “She Needs Your Faith” and a stark “Fly Sparrow Fly” that relies only on acoustic guitar and lap steel for support as Salett ominously sings, “One moment love can be most everywhere/One moment, lost forever.” Then there’s album highlight “Far, Far Away,” which arches into the spine-tingling refrain “Remember me,” then drills down into dirty, muted electricity before arching back into the refrain.

However, the overabundant additional tracks on “In the Ocean of the Stars” are merely pleasant, sometimes redundant and occasionally half-baked. Plus Salett’s fairly fey vocals grow tiring, especially as the release fizzles toward the end.

Perhaps Dracula should have died here, too.

¥ 

Ÿ4THE CURSE OF COMPANYŸ5 

“Leo Magnets Joins A Gang” 

(Dangerbird) 

Few experiences are more comforting than that twilight of consciousness that blankets your brain when sleep and wakefulness engage in a benign battle for your attention. That is, unless you feel external or internal pressure to either go to sleep or wake up — then it’s just stressful.

The Curse of Company’s somnolent “Leo Magnets Joins a Gang” is in a sense the sound equivalent of that state of being. At times it’s focused (albeit soft-focused), at others it drifts into a detached atmosphere that seems out of human control, like a dream. Both mildly settling and mildly unsettling, there’s a melancholy feel to the release that seems to follow a grim, Cormac McCarthy-style story of doom and decay.

Spearheaded by Dappled Cities’ Dave Rennick, the Curse of Company slowly trundles through a bleak yet beguiling aural-scape, starting with the mournful procession of the melodic opener, “The Parade Devine,” where vocalists Rennick and Sarah Kelly weave in and out of a mix that swoops into a mini-grand arc.

A haze hangs over most tracks, including the indistinct lullaby “Fleets in the Fog,” which features hollow and echoing vocals, as well as the slo-mo swaggering, piano-based waltz “Side by Side,” the smudgy, sashaying “The Kites of Our Countries” and the electric-pulsing “Oh Brother.”

For diversions, the lush, though unhurried, “Homecoming” shakes “Leo Magnets” out of the clouds, and “All the Mines” injects jarring jangle and bounce. But generally, “Leo Magnets Joins a Gang” merely floats by in some alternate reality.

This arty project is inescapably loaded with pretentiousness, but at least most listeners will be too drowsy to notice or care.

¥ 

Ÿ4THE BUGŸ5 

“London Zoo” 

(Ninja Tune) 

A long time partner of Godflesh and Jesu’s Justin Broadrick (in God, Ice, the Sidewinder, Curse of the Golden Vampire and Techno Animal), Kevin Martin cradled obsessive talents for years under collaborative projects, all secretly his babies, but found in his Bug project a rare calling within dancehall and the raw blueprint for what would one day be called dubstep. The Bug is terminal. It lays off the dub-poetry-laden side of Pressure on London Zoo, but it heightens the zero hour terror of what exactly it means to be (barely) alive in Summer of 2008, the shuffling and volatile heartbeat of history ready to rain down distress from every corner. Martin shines floodlights in those corners, revealing a barefaced volatility as palpable as that found on Dre’s “The Chronic” (recorded mere weeks after the LA riots).

His Jamaican-by-way-of-England guest MCs splatter “London Zoo’s” canvas with blood, vitriol, and plangent dystopianist alarmism. Martin himself scores the mayhem with machine gun jolts, ominous tolling bells, murky sub-bass, and reverberating dystopianist alarm clocks, from the 8-bit bleeper to the seizure-stuttering variety. The Bug is viral.

Even though the MCs inked their own diatribes independent of one another for separate sessions, occasionally even in direct discord with one another thematically, the individual tracks still piece together like snap-puzzle components, as if they were each tapping into the same conversation, the same synaptic nerve of the collective unconscious. The Bug is infectious. It’s a vision of a world gripped by prepossessed fear and hatred, as if by a “rage” outbreak. It’s also packed with full-on soundboy contagions of propulsive beats and lyrical hooks, enjoyable as much as a ghettoblaster that scares the neighborhood children, a paranoid headphone chin-scratcher guaranteed to bring about a case of stoned inertia creeps. 

— Timothy Gabriele 

¥ 

Ÿ4THE FAINTŸ5 

“Fasciinatiion” 

(blank.wav) 

While the Faint have been kicking around for over a decade, their danceable retro-styled, synth-fueled punk is currently “en vogue” thanks to the explosion of nostalgia for all-things ‘80s — or just things that remind us of the ‘80s. Very little has changed since their last album. The band formed their own label. Lead singer Todd Baechle got married and changed his last name to “Fink.” And the Faint’s punky, indie-rocktronic dance sound is still firmly intact. Now that we’re all caught up, one thing has changed. The Faint may sound the same stylistically; however, they’ve fallen in line with the statement-heavy lyrics that usually accompany the indie-rock genre.

This social consciousness has been merged with the Faint’s signature carefree smack in the mouth of boogie-friendly synth and electronica that would be right at home at a rave. Lyrically, “Fasciinatiion” leans heavily in the direction of sci-fi in its vision of the future. The Gary Numan-esque “The Geeks Were Right”, a plucky sci-fi odyssey stands right alongside “99 Luftballoons” as one of the most cheerful laments about future catastrophe, ever.

Bass-heavy electronic burps pulsate behind Fink’s monotone vocal stylings, managing a shred of emotion of a rendered-speechless Lovecraft-meets-Orwellian protagonist with the song’s chorus, “When I saw the future / The geeks were right.” At other times, the Faint speak volumes with their car crash pile-up lyrics. The bleak “A Battle Hymn for Children” intertwines a criticism of war and raising a future generation for nothing but. The band’s essence remains the same and their latest offering maintains the band’s spirit of whimsy, but there is a more serious tone all around. The Faint have grown up. Just a bit. 

— Lana Cooper 

C¥ 

Ÿ4MURS & 9TH WONDERŸ5 

“Sweet Lord” 

(self-released) 

With 11 years under his belt and plenty of albums and collaborations to fill his portfolio, Murs returned to the studio with 9th Wonder to make “Sweet Lord,” their third album together. Similarly, 9th was busy with former group Little Brother as well as other duos and guest spots. If you have been keeping track, this album is just slightly out-of-nowhere. The only major promotion for the record came during the week before its online release.

But it did come out two years after their last stellar effort, “Murray’s Revenge,” which dropped two years after their equally amazing debut, “Murs 3:16: The 9th Edition.” Unlike those albums, however, “Sweet Lord” is more of a promotion than a standalone record. With his major label debut, “Murs for President,” coming soon, Murs decided to give back to his faithful fans by offering this one for free. Radiohead basically started the pay-what-you-want system, but unlike “In Rainbows,” this one is just a gift. Keeping in line with the other 9th and Murs efforts, “Sweet Lord” is a 10-track, under-40-minute collection of braggadocio, humor, soul, and boom-bap.

There is nothing on Sweet Lord that comes close to the level of “Walk Like a Man” or “D.S.W.G. (Dark Skinned White Girls)” off the first two albums. “Marry Me” and “Nina Ross” almost get there, but they lack that extra punch. Also, a lot of the tracks, no matter how enjoyable, sound rushed. And it’s probably accurate to say that they were, especially considering that both Murs and 9th have been busy with other projects. Still, this builds the anticipation for “Murs for President” most effectively. 

— Andrew Martin 

¥ 

Ÿ4SMART PEOPLEŸ5 

(2008, 95 min.) 

Dir.: Noam Murro 

Though smarter-than-your-average Hollywood comedy, this tale of academia and dysfunction still works only fitfully, despite a top-notch cast that includes Dennis Quaid, Sarah Jessica Parker, Thomas Haden Church and Ellen Page, who earned an Academy Award nomination for the title role in 2007’s “Juno.” Quaid plays a curmudgeonly college professor who sustains a head injury that throws him together with a former student turned doctor (Parker), while he copes with his shady brother (Church) and ultraconservative daughter (Page). The DVD and Blu-ray disc feature nine deleted scenes, cast and crew interviews and commentary with director Noam Murro and screenwriter Mark Jude Poirier. There’s also a segment on the film’s premiere at the Sundance Film Festival. DVD, $29.99; Blu-ray, $34.99. (Disney)

Ÿ4BRAND UPON THE BRAIN!Ÿ5 

(2008, 99 min.) 

Dir.: Guy Maddin 

“ #=EP=#Canadian cult filmmaker Guy Maddin presents another film either truly wondrous or just plain weird, depending on your tolerance for the visual and sonic magic he layers onto his dense storytelling. His latest follows the adventures of a character named “Guy Maddin,” who returns to his family homestead — an island lighthouse — to paint the structure by request of his aging mother. From there, the film flits backward to a wild rush of suppressed childhood memories involving his autocratic mom, his basement-inventor father, a murder mystery and strange experiments conducted on orphans. Shot in black and white Super 8, with flickering images that hark back to the earliest days of film, the story also is presented as a silent flick with live music and narration that was provided by such actors as Isabella Rossellini and Crispin Glover for some of the movie’s theatrical runs. The DVD has narration tracks by Rossellini (who starred in Maddin’s “The Saddest Music in the World”), Glover, Eli Wallach and others, including Maddin himself. There’s also a deleted scene, a documentary on Maddin and two new short films he directed. DVD, $39.95. (Criterion) #=EP=#¥ 

-RT>