  
Review:
The lush Moroccan Spirit emphasizes music's meditative qualities, but this imaginative mix of traditional and modern also works on a less contemplative level. The Brave--the guy behind Sacred Spirit, Indigo Spirit, and B-Tribe--traveled throughout Morocco over a five-year period with a microphone and a tape recorder, capturing the essence of both the Arab and Berber cultures. He then wove these disparate musical threads into a cohesive multicultural musical fabric using unobtrusive electronic beats and studio programming. There's even a bit of electronic groove on some of the more upbeat tracks. "Jim I Nim" and "La Mamounia" crackle with the vitality of traditional Moroccan dance music, but could easily work at hip world-music-friendly nightclubs. Mellow highlights include the somber "Music for 1001 Nights: Outro" and "Moroccan Soul," which is propelled by soulful women singers. The album's not as challenging as the more radical hybrids using North African music, but Moroccan Spirit is far more than mere background noise. --Tad Hendrickson
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