Schnitzer, a band from Zuerich

I'm excited to present you with the new album by Schnitzer. Very catchy, cool guitar work. There's only one song I can't play on the radio due to some f-words. Check 'em out on their Myspace page.

Solar Impulse has been unveiled

Bertrand Piccard's latest venture, a solar plane to circle the globe with, has been unveiled.

Find out much more on the website solarimpulse.com

Phenomden music video

A simple, cool video by Swiss reggae artist Phenomden:

More new music on Eurobureau May 13

Haydamaky from Ukraine, currently on a tour of Europe. I just listened to their album "Kobzar" and I'm impressed with their blend of traditional and modern sounds.

Here's some text from their myspace page, where you can hear a bunch of their tunes:

HAYDAMAKY – well known Ukrainian band through whose artwork you can hear and feel the great mixture of traditional motives and modern musical tendencies.

“Our destination is to make contemporary Ukrainian culture “cool”, trendy, fashioned, adopted into other world cultures and to gain for young Ukraine as widest as possible recognition throughout the world.” - O. Yarmola, Haydamaky

With the name HAYDAMAKY they are on stage since 2001. Starting from early ‘90ies till present HAYDAMAKY are touring Europe. Quite different from other popular Ukrainian musicians who are mostly working under cliché of soviet style or just copy/pasting western and American stars HAYDAMAKY are trying to show the elements of traditional Ukrainian music through mixture influenced and made of different cultures joint with modern musical styles.

Music of HAYDAMAKY is inspired by ethnic sounds from all around the world, especially from different regions of Ukraine such as Polissya, Bukovyna and Carpathian mountains so as the sounds of Jamaica, Ireland ethno-rock and hot sounds of Balkans and Moldova.

HAYDAMAKY are well known around Europe, so they are welcome guests in countries like Estonia, Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Romania, Germany, Netherlands, Belgium, Austria, Slovenia, Switzerland, Spain, Portugal and of course – Ukraine. Geography of HAYDAMAKY is growing on and on.

Bligg,

a Swiss hip-hop artist, also blends traditional sounds with modern styles. Hackbrett (a hammered dulcimer) and accordion meets hip-hop beat. He has expanded his repertoire, very catchy tunes, highly produced, sounds like a large band. Some songs are very funny, others have more serious themes, like the song "Secondos" about immigrants and how much they have done for Switzerland.

His website is bligg.ch, and you can find him on myspace as well.

more coming...

Outcry from Inuits as EU bans seal products - Radio Netherlands Worldwide

Read the story on Radio Netherlands website

Most European countries back seal products embargo

At a meeting of ambassadors of the 27 European Union states, most countries came out in favour of a total ban on importing seal-related products because of Canada's controversial slaughtering methods. Click below for the article on France24.

And to read the rest for the story, get more here now.

Swine Flu Humor

One of these women returned from vacation in Mexico. Which one?

from Cyberpresse.ca

Danish police hug cyclists and hand out helmets

found on boingboing.net

Video of police in Denmark stopping bicyclists, hugging them, and giving them helmets. Happiness all around.

Östblocket: "yes, we are a Swedish Balkan band!"

Check them out on their Myspace page 

Holland: Queen's Day invitations spark controversy

Amsterdam is inviting people from all over the world to come to the Queen's Day festivities on April 30, celebrated by hundreds of thousands of orange clad partygoers. But not everybody is amused by the poster campaign that comes with the invitation.

Read the rest of the story on the Radio Netherlands website