as if western music comes from some other planet. With the exceptions of certain entries in the Eurovision song contest, all music is 'world music'.

However, strictly meaningless it may be, 'world music' is now an accepted part of the language, and it carries with it a set of assumptions that need to be understood by those who would use it. There is a western tendency to regard music from beyond the safe confines of the Anglophone first world as 'ethnic' or 'traditional', a tendency which can stray very quickly into racism. Certainly, the first examples of music from the rest of the planet to reach western ears during the 'world music' boom of the '80s were marketed as 'authentic' and 'original' and aficionados went to great lengths to discover the ultimate sources of certain musical traditions. Easier than trusting your own ears, I suppose.

But of course, music is a continuum, and musicians, wherever they are, will always change, adapt, borrow and steal from their environment. Ironically, if there is any music that can be truly described as 'world' it is the bland, western pop music culture that has spread around the globe, reaching the ears of the younger generations wherever radios are turned on. And musicians in west Africa, North Korea and East Timor are just as capable of tuning their radios as we are. So there is a new generation of musicians from around the world now emerging who can play their own music without the burden of cultural or national stereotypes to live up to.

Typical of this new wave of musicians is Guinean 'griot' Ba Cissoko, whose Electric Griot Land group arrive in Dublin this week. Cissoko's family have been traditional 'griots' of the Manding culture of west Africa for generations, and masters of the 21-string harp called the kora. But like most of us, the latest Cissoko grew up listening to reggae, jazz, and rock'n'roll, and has said that he is determined "to modernise the mandigue tradition to better spread it; to transgress it to really honour it".

With more than a nod to Hendrix, Electric Griot Land is a four piece, featuring bass, percussion and two kora players, the younger of whom, Sekou Kouyate, employs distortion and wah-wah effects on his instrument. No doubt there are those in Guinea who believe that the kora should not be abused in this way, but judging by reactions to their shows around the world, Irish audiences will find much to relish in Electric Griot Land. They play the Village on Thursday as part of the Festivale Internationale de la Chanson Francophone, run jointly by the French Cultural Service and Alliance Francais.

One of the most remarkable fusions in the world, and one that bypassed western influence almost entirely, is the one between Latin American and African music. Since Africans were first brought in chains to the Caribbean, there has been a twoway musical traffic across the southern Atlantic, and of all the many different strands and stories, the origins on the Garifuna community in Belize is one of the most fascinating.

The roots of the Garifuna can be traced back to the 17th century, when two slave ships en route from west Africa ran aground off the coast of St Vincent. The survivors intermarried with the island's indigenous Carib people, creating a fiercely independent community that resisted European colonisation, and the African influence can still be heard in the seductive grooves of the Garifuna sound.

Belize's leading musician and ambassador is guitarist and songwriter Andy Palacio, and he has gathered a large intergenerational group of Garifuna musicians together to tour and perform. A seductive blend of African grooves and Latin American guitars, Palacio's group have garnered deserved praise around the world.

Andy Palacio and the Garifuna Collective play the Village on Friday 15 June.