Ever since my evil company (OOPS! They monitor… Ahem… My lovely company that gave me the job I enjoy very much!) took away our streaming media capabilites, I lost access to “Radio Parrot Keys”. So that means it’s CD burning time. But I, like a dumbass, didn’t write down any of the songs they used to play or the bands that played them. Anybody know some good stuff? I need my steel drum bands!
(of course I know of Buffet, but he only goes so far)
Day-O? 
Harry Belafonte is always good… Anybody have anything newer?
Ziggy Marley and the Melody Makers.
[ul][li]Putumayo World Music puts out consistently good all-round collections of music from, well, the warmer regions of our planet.[/li][li]If your local public radio station carries it, Afropop Worldwide is a great program of music from the entire African diaspora, which includes great swaths of the Caribbean, Brazil, and U.S. in addition to, of course, Africa.[/li][li]Looking for dance music? Try these categories: salsa, merengue, cumbia, soca (combination of soul and calypso), and zouk.[/li][li]Try Buena Vista Social Club - music from some great Cuban masters - and the solo outputs of the musicians on that CD.[/li][li]How 'bout some fusion? Try Kirsty MacColl’s (RIP) latest effort, Tropical Brainstorm, for that Anglo-Latin beat (it’s better than the description sounds), and the band Orquesta de la Luz for Japanese salsa (really).[/li]I Googled on “Our Boys Steel Orchestra” and came up with The Trinidad Online Pan Music Store. Sounds like an intriguing source.[/ul]Hope this’ll get you started.
David Rudder is always good. I have the album ‘1990’, (OK, it’s a little old) that is really good and doesn’t sound like everything else. His other stuff is good too, but they all seem very different.
When I was in Venezuela, I heard someone there named Bonny Cepeda, who has some good stuff too.
Billy Joel’s from Long Island. Does he count?
<giggle>
Just thinking of what “Piano Man” would sound like in reaggae…
HA! Shaggy!
You can’t go wrong with EXOTICA! The Best of Martin Denny (Rhino R2 70774). It’s got bird calls and EVERYTHING!
The opening cut, “Quiet Village,” is a classic of Sputnik-era Tiki surrealism, and was a best-selling single in 1957.