This was a doozy. I found all the music, made the medley, and wrote the script (most of it at least) all less than 24 hours of doing this episode. But hey, not bad I think. It was a bit ambitious to try and fit the entire region into one episode, considering it consists of nine-ish countries. If you listened, you know why I’m including the ish. I’d say most people don’t include Greece and Turkey, but hey, its my show. I needed some diversity. This episode really let me open up to a part of the world that I’ve always admired from a distance, but never known too much about in detail. Afterwards, I really wanted some Turkish pastry. Turkish delight sounds really good. Or just Turkish food in general. Mmmmmmm. Right, so the Balkans. Finding the music for this episode was considerably more difficult than I thought it would be. It isn’t that the music from the region is not good (or at least semi-enjoyable), its that so much of it sounds the same. I can’t figure out what it is, but there is some sort of rapid, twirling sound in almost every pop song from the region. It sounds similar to music from Latin America, but I just can’t figure out what it is. Tarkan’s “Şımarık” is a great example of this. Its some fast-paced, electronic string sort-of thing. If anyone knows, please let me know! I would definitely like to visit some of the countries here. Istanbul, Neum in Bosnia, Mykonos in Greece, and more. I wonder how prevalent ethnic tensions still are in the region. The Yugoslav wars were only 30ish years ago, and many people today either lived through or grew up in that period. Either way, it is an incredibly diverse region with not quite as diverse, but still good, music. Here is the episode and playlist as always, thanks for reading!

Playlist: http://khdx.fm/playlists/the-balkans/


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