Ever since I first read (and wrote) about Smithsonian Global Sound I thought I'd like to buy music off them, not only because a) they're keen on getting the money to the artists, who are mostly very, very small in the business, b) one can browse the Smithsonian Global Sound-archive either geographically or by instrument (and, of course, through more detailed queries) but also because one can download the purchased music in the MP3-format, as well as the FLAC-format.

I know [avatar:https://niklasblog.com/bilder/avatars/zak.gif]Zak[/avatar] is reading this, thinking "you dirty FLAC whore!", and by Bog, you're almost right - I'm a FLAC john! But I've got to feed my new audio player with it, as it reads that format - and I love to hear music the way it's meant to be heard, hah!

While rummaging through the archives, I managed to find an album that I'll give my dad. I seldom find music he likes. Before I go into details on this specific album, I'll just jot down a quick note to make you see what my family's had to put up with (apart from my musical tastes and wonderful guitar-playing) at home when dad's given the stereo a spin. During my days of existence, I've found two songs that my dad loves, and I'm not making this up. My mom's more than welcome to comment the exactness of this claim if she likes. One of the tracks is Ravel's "Bolero". I'm currently laughing so hard I have trouble typing, as the following quote came up #1 on a Google search of "ravel bolero":

Commentary on whether the well-known romantic classical music composition, Ravel's Bolero, was in fact the symptom of the onset of Alzheimers Disease or a brain tumor, due to similarities between the repetition in the music and alzheimer's symptoms.

I won't go into that further because I dislike the thought of laughing until my spleen ruptures. The second track my dad worships is "Stayin' Alive", by The Bee Gees. But not performed by them; the one that's covered by N-Trance. Oh, ruthless dad.

You get the picture. This is why I wanted to give him a taste of his roots, so when I found "Frula - Yugoslav Folk Ensemble" and listened to it for a bit, I went happy. Not even 10USD later, I was downloading it in FLAC qualiy at 180KB/s. The tracks are available for my DL'ing during the next 72 hours. Perfect. To pimp this further, I'll say one doesn't have to buy a whole album at a time. You can buy a billion tracks (or one) and simply get that.

So we'll see what dear old dad says when he hears the tones of his youth. Somehow I don't think this music lives up to the greatness of N-Trance or the seemingly neurally challenged "Bolero", but then again, I wonder why he never was very much impressed by my incessant playing of Einstürzende Neubauten and Merzbow back in the day...