Manu Chao: La Radiolina

The busy, happy swirl of Manu Chao's revolutionary party music, with its science-fiction bleeps, happy ska horns, anthemic lyrics, driving rhythms, and ebullient high spirits, is instantly recognizable even as Chao switches up styles, sounds, and genres on nearly every track. His politically charged goodtime music on the spunky new CD La Radiolina betrays his allegiance to the open-minded experimentation and socialist politics of his heroes in The Clash, as his always-adventurous sound embraces a crazy mélange of music from around the globe. He's a one-man musical melting pot who synthesizes several continents' worth of ideas, sounds, and slogans into one swinging all-night dance party. This is internationalism at its funkiest.