Entertainer Sophie Tucker was, among women entertainers, sort of like Al Jolson and Ted Lewis rolled into one: a pioneering singer of blues, popular, Yiddish, and sentimental songs. Her career was so early that, even in the 1960s when she appeared regularly on Ed Sullivan’s show, she was well past her prime. However, there was a time when Sophie Tucker was at the center of the universe in American entertainment, and this time, Sophie Tucker’s time, is finally captured on Archeophone’s release Sophie Tucker: Origins of the Red Hot Mama.

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Previously on Hot Damn Jamz, we were lamenting our cubicle-bound status, but now spring has sprung and we’re back with a mini-world tour of hot damn jamz from acts that criss-cross the globe. From vintage-sounding reggae that conjures Jamaica via Brooklyn, to the finest neo-post-punk and acid house the UK has to offer, to Australia’s new wave disco revolution and many points in between, we’ve got it all covered — with a stop at Christmas Island to boot. Hot damn, it’s like Xmas in April.

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Dent May is an unlikely lad to be cast in the mold of a pop star. Baby-faced, precious and bespectacled in a way no one has been since the demise of Larry “Bud” Melman, May even plays the ukulele, for Pete’s sake. Fortunately for him “dorky” is the new undorky (thanks to fellas like Vampire Weekend) and fortunately for lovers of smart, fun and undeniably collegiate pop, May was discovered by Animal Collective, who put out his lovely new album The Good Feeling Music of Dent May & His Magnificent Ukulele. The highlight of the record is the incredibly sweet and catchy “Meet Me in the Garden,” which percolates gently like Sergio Mendes gone new wave with a touch of soft rock smoothness. The lo-budget video was shot in a trailer in May’s Mississippi hometown and remarkably features May reclining in a bubble bath whilst crooning the tune. Luckily, there are no sightings of his magnificent ukulele.

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Featuring DJ/producers Tone and Papa Sparks, Version Big-Fi are the Reading, U.K. duo responsible for Stop That Train, a podcast of killer roots reggae selections plus dub cuts old and new. They recently released the Crux Collide Hybridize album, a pay-what-you-want digital download filled with bottomless bass and echoing dub sounds. It’s the follow-up to their debut full-length Everything But which was nominated for “Best Dub Recording or Album” at the 2008 Reggae Academy Awards in Kingston, Jamaica. Check the hypnotizing and almost inert video for the Crux track “Static” plus their truly heavy dub-step remix of New Order’s “Blue Monday”. Stop by their website for all the downloads and to check out the new single “The Hip Gahn Drop” with vocals from his lordship, the one and only Lord Buckley.

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Black Jake & the Carnies are a curious octet out of Ypsilanti, MI who specialize in a kind of raucous acoustic Americana that tosses post modern Appalachian murder ballads, Irish drinking songs, skewed, twisted love songs, and general cautionary tales into a stylistic blender that has them sounding like nothing so much as a maverick, hopped-up punk polka band in full 21st Century everything-fits jug band mode. The band itself calls what it does “crabgrass,” but although the instrumentation (banjo, guitar, mandolin, acoustic bass, etc.) suggests bluegrass, the approach is something else again, and the supplementary instruments, which include washboard, train whistle, jug, and all manner of odd percussion toys, make the Carnies something closer to a manic jug and string band from the 19th century.

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Like Stephen Wilkinson’s other Bibio albums, Vignetting the Compost is as literal as it is charming. Blending and transforming parts and pieces so they become a whole is equally vital to making compost and making music, and this is especially true in Bibio’s world, where folk meets electronica, and recognizeable instruments mesh with undefinable but oddly comforting textures and field recordings. Since Fi, Wilkinson’s flair for creating hazy atmospheres has been the most striking thing about Bibio’s music, and his gifts in that department are still strong. “Everglad Everglade” decorates the acoustic guitars that provide the album’s backbone with flutes, birdsong and chirping frogs, and “Over the Hills and Far Away”’s metallic percussion clatters like a rickety old bicycle. Vignetting the Compost also remains true to the vignette part of its title, with many tracks that are just long enough to make a gentle impression, like the brief flutter of “Dopplerton” and “Odd Paws”‘ shoegaze-tinged fog.

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Too often, it seems that music videos, especially animated ones, need to be elaborate — and ideally computer generated — to impress: Witness Kanye West’s state-of-the-art, rotoscoped mini-movie for his latest single “Heartless.” However, artists like London’s Roses Kings Castles prove that there’s still plenty of room for the homespun and hand-drawn when it comes to animation and music videos. A robotic couple, a city with gear-driven sidewalks and streaky magic markers make up the utterly charming clip for “Entroubled” from Roses Kings Castles’ self-titled debut album. “Entroubled”’s cheeky chappy pop sounds more than a little like Babyshambles, which makes sense considering that Adam Ficek, the man behind Roses Kings Castles, is that band’s drummer.

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Whether your idea of soul music is Wilson Pickett and Eddie Floyd or Amy Winehouse and Mark Ronson, you’d better do yourself a favor and get hip to the power of David Brinston, a.k.a. the Love Maker. A part of the underground soul circuit kept alive by labels like Malaco and Ecko, and artists like Marvin Sease (The Candy Licker), Brinston is the real deal. His alternately sweet and gruff vocals have some Al Green — okay… a lot of Al Green — in them; the guy could easily have fit on Hi right alongside Syl Johnson or O.V. Wright. The music may not always reach Hi standards, but Brinston’s voice glides right over the occasional clunky synth or cheesy drum machine. The songs are also classics of the doggin’ around, making time, and getting down to the nitty gritty school. Check the titles of a few: “Somebody’s Cuttin My Cake,” “Back It Up and Put It Here,” “Junk in the Trunk.”

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