What better way to start off the day after World Oceans Day than with the world premiere of the underwater video for a previously unreleased Paul McCartney song?

As a musician, Moby needs no introduction: millions of albums sold, songs in films and commercials, and those black, chunky glasses. But on the occasion of his ninth studio album, he’s coming out as a photographer too. Destroyed, a book of photographs that accompanies the album of the same title out this month, takes us on tour with the eclectic star across places, spaces, and continents. The images are spare, stark, and vibrant, set in airports, airplanes, hotels, corridors, and concert arenas. The latter, taken from Moby’s on-stage point of view, are the only ones filled with the presence of others in this gallery that points to the “strangeness of touring.”

Before a recent talk at National Geographic headquarters, Moby stopped to chat with Pop Omnivore. He’s taken pictures for 35 years—as long as he’s been making music—and credits a photographer uncle with introducing him to the craft. He says he doesn’t know which he would choose if he were forced to live without sight or sound, but his musings at the end of a long evening might have offered a clue. Said the artist: “I hope to be making music until the day I die."

You’ve taken pictures since you were ten. Do you think audio or visual is a more potent form of expression?

The methodology of creating music is so very different for me than the methodology behind creating a photograph. Photography’s really quick; it’s spontaneous and immediate. For me, taking pictures is documenting, and making music is a long, creative process. From start to finish a song can take me a year, two years, and there are so many different components to it. I’m always working on every last little aspect of it.

What subjects intrigue you as a photographer?

I love what empty spaces say about people. My favorite thing to take pictures of: completely neutral, empty spaces. I’m so much more interested in an empty chair than in a chair with a person sitting in it. Aesthetically I like the simplicity and purity, like just simple angles. But it’s almost like aesthetic forensics where you take a picture of an empty space. On the one hand there’s a simple beauty to it, but it’s also trying to understand us as a species through the things we’ve created.

Your book, Destroyed, takes us on tour with you, to cities around the world, through empty spaces and airports and concert venues. It made me wonder: Where do you feel most at home?

British Airways international business class has an upper deck that’s my favorite place on the planet. I’m not trying to be a shill for British Airways but they have these flat beds that are sort of private. They have five windows and flying from London to Los Angeles—I’m pretty happy up there. Because you look out the window & it’s just this beautiful simple skyscape for 11 hours. For better or worse that’s where I feel most at home.

If you had to live without sight or sound, which one would you choose?

Wow, it’s the single hardest question I’ve been asked, and I don’t know. I truly don’t know.

Maybe we can relate it back to the first question about different modes of expression. Is there a way to describe the relationship between music and photography?

Music is ineffable. Music has no form whatsoever—all it is is air moving just a little bit differently. It’s the only art form that you can’t touch. You can touch a CD, an iPod, but music technically doesn’t exist. Once it hits your ear, you have a reaction to it, and it’s gone. Sometimes we think that’s a song about trucks, or forests, or that’s a song about a girl named Jenny, but it’s still just air moving a little bit differently. And photography—most visual arts are much more formal, etymologically in the true sense of the word, like pertaining to a specific form. It’s almost like left brain/right brain. But when they work together, especially film and music, boy it’s just perfect.

-Luna Shyr

When a world leader dons bizarre outfits to make speeches—which can end in a flash or escalate into hour-long rants—and responds to protests with deadly force, then claims he’s popular with everyone, including the opposition, he is bound to become the toast of YouTube.

Just ask Muammar Qaddafi, whose antics have sparked an array of online spoofs in the past few weeks.

Over the past decade, Latin funk band Grupo Fantasma has been hailed by many critics for its new-world meets old-school music. Their sound combines big band sounds with Caribbean reggae, and Afro-jazz, along with cumbia (see below for more on that genre). Now, the Austin-based 10-piece orchestra has garnered its first Grammy Award for its 2010 album, El Existential, on the Nat Geo Music label. Pitted against some of the biggest names in Latin music, Grupo Fantasma took home the prize for Best Latin Rock, Alternative or Urban Album.

Guitarist Beto Martinez spoke with us about how the band got started, the roots of its music, and what it feels like to win a Grammy.

Most of us know salsa and reggae, but what exactly is cumbia?

Cumbia is a style that originated in Colombia but it’s a mix of sounds. It has a little Caribbean influence and an African influence. It’s a style of music that really proliferated in South America and then spread north all the way into Mexico, where it then turned into another style altogether. Now, there are all of these regional styles that make it different. Eventually we became exposed to the original, or the older forms that came from Colombia, and that’s what we fell in love with. It has kind of a more big band sound.

In the late 19th century, Portuguese immigrants brought a stringed instrument to Hawaii, the locals tinkered with it, and the ukulele was born. Now the state’s favorite instrument--schoolkids all learn it in the fifth grade--is getting a new image, courtesy of the inventive strumming of 34-year-old Hawaiian native Jake Shimabukuro. His latest CD, “Peace Love Ukelele,” takes the ukulele places it’s never been before, including a wistful cover of Queen’s power ballad “Bohemian Rhapsody.” As he embarked on a national tour, Shimabukuro spoke with National Geographic's Marc Silver.

The second season of Glee is upon us. And even though fans may think they know everything about the show, there is a lot they likely do not know about the history of real-life glee clubs.

Surprising Point #1: “Glee” doesn’t mean what you think it does.

It's hard to resist the beats: chest-rattling, hip-hop meets bhangra. Suddenly you're moving, involuntarily, grinning along with the eight guys on stage. Their instruments weave together, jazzy-smooth but purposeful. An emcee implores "Everybody jump! JUMP!" and you do, with dozens or hundreds or thousands of others, giddily. And then the spine-tingling klezmer sax starts in, and that's when you know you're at a Balkan Beat Box show.

In Veracruz, Mexico, the sound of the harp is part of the sound of the town. Players pluck a 36-string wooden instrument on street corners, in restaurants, and during Catholic Masses. Known as the Veracruz harp, it came to the New World in the 1500s from Spain. In the 2000s the harp is entering the vocabulary of American popular music. The California-based group Rey Fresco—Spanish for “king cool”—incorporates the assertive Veracruz pluck in its reggae-Caribbean-Latin fusion music.

The group’s harpist is Xocoyotzin Moraza, 28, who grew up in Ventura, California. Xocoyotzin is an Aztec name meaning “first born son,” “extension of a father,” and “something new or fresh.” In Moraza’s case, the definitions are all true. His dad, Antonio, made the harp. And Xocoyotzin is bringing its sound into a new musical environment via Rey Fresco, whose debut album, The People, was released this fall. (Although the name has its downside. “The first day of school was interesting,” says Xocoyotzin, who always had to explain how to say his name: sho-ko-yo-tsen. Maybe that’s why his nickname is Xoco (pronounced sho-ko.)

Cracked Latin is a band that does—and doesn’t—live up to its name. The sound is Ricky Ricardo’s horn-driven cha-cha-chá meets psychedelic rock—definitely “cracked Latin.” The band members may be a bit offbeat as well, but they aren’t exactly Latin. Luis Accorsi (above, left) is an Italian who grew up in Venezuela and now lives in Buffalo. He performs with Jewish New Yorker Lane Steinberg (right). “Talk about cultural misplacement,” Steinberg jokes.<p>

The video for their song “International Accident” is a case of artistic misplacement. No one is quite sure where it came from. A “crazy Venezuelan friend,” says Steinberg, passed on the animated saga of a chalk-drawn figure who camps out in the wild, strolls along a sidewalk that lights up, and then finds itself hanging for dear life by a finger—images that turn out to be spot-on for a song about strange goings-on in the world today. And for capturing the band’s cracked quality.<p>

10. The number of featured musicians from the video kicking off a 23-date North American tour to promote “peace and community and mindful joy” through music.

6. The number of songs Mark Johnson, co-founder of Playing for Change, the grassroots organization behind the song and tour, listed when asked for his top five songs of all time.

On the eve of the tour I asked Johnson to talk about the group he founded in 2001 and how his effort differs from the time at camp when we all had to hold hands and sing “Kumbaya.”

Rivers Cuomo, lead singer for the alt-rock group Weezer, was leafing through the August issue of National Geographic when he found it—the picture he wanted on the cover of the band’s new release, Raditude. The jumping dog was one of the “Your Shot” selections—those are photos submitted by our readers. His name is Sidney and he is a three-year-old mutt whose mom was a Labrador mix.

We spoke with the dog’s owner, 34-year-old Connecticut librarian Jason Neely, about America’s newest canine star. Sadly, Sidney himself was unavailable for comment. “He’s passed out on the floor right now,” Neely said. “We were up in Maine and just picked him up at the boarders. He’s been partying with his doggie friends.”

Here at National Geographic, we always strive to be rational. Yet it never occurred to us to copyright the phrase “Rational Geographic.” And now it’s too late!

Rational Geographic Volume II is the new release from rock musician Michael John Hancock’s group Awesome New Republic. The extended-play album is available free as a download and sold on iTunes and Amazon. We spoke to singer and guitarist Hancock, 27, about the origins of the phrase “Rational Geographic” and about his pop-inflected music, which he describes as sounding as if “the radio is having a panic attack.”

While New Yorkers put on all their green and stake out a prime spot on the parade route that is stumbling distance to an endless supply of Guinness, the Irish band members of Bell X1 will indulge in a diner breakfast, prep for an appearance on David Letterman, then jet off to Boston for a St. Patrick’s Day gig.

Bell X1 is perhaps best known for providing the soundtrack to a scene with two girls kissing to “Eve, the Apple of My Eye” on the teen drama The O.C., “We’ll take our breaks where we can get them,” said lead singer, Paul Noonan, at a recent show. The crowd sang along to their quirky lyrics and beats, which have been compared to Talking Heads and Coldplay.

Growing up in the suburbs of Dublin, Noonan says that on March 17th he would usually pin some clover on his jacket, watch the capital’s St. Patrick’s Day parade, and go home before the streets became “awash in vomit.”

There’s a chance you’ve never heard of the Jonas Brothers, and if you’re younger than 15, there’s a chance you don’t have a Jonas Brothers poster hanging in your bedroom. But the chances of either are slim.

The teen pop trio from New Jersey have released three chart-topping albums in the last three years and inspire the sort of lust, obsession, and mass fainting spells that make comparisons to the Beatles inevitable.

While the dreamy sibs have certainly achieved success overseas, we wondered if the boy band equation (cute young guys + catchy tunes = $) holds true in other regions of the world. The answer? Definitely.

Just as she promised, Marcia Ball cooked up “emergency gumbo and shrimp remoulade”— for those days when you just don’t have time to labor over the stove—at the Smithsonian Folklife Festival. She did all the work in 15 minutes, then just had to wait another 15 for the flavors to meld.

Here’s what you need on hand:

1 cup flour
1 cup oil
2 big onions
1 green pepper
some garlic
4 boxes chicken broth
2 rotisserie chickens (already cooked)
2 bay leaves
green onions for garnish
parsley
salt
pepper
cayenne pepper

The flour and oil are for the roux, a thickening agent. It can take a good 30 minutes  to stir that flour and oil in a pan until it reduces to a rich brown hue. And it takes a lot of elbow grease. So you have permission to cheat. Ball reports that her brother was waiting in line at a Lafayette, Louisiana, post office and listening to the other waitees talk about food. And they all used roux from a jar. (Google “bottled roux,” and there it is!) “I guarantee that restaurants do it, too,” said Ball. “And you can’t tell the difference.”

In a large pot, she poured some of that chicken broth, and added the chopped onion and green pepper. She didn’t add tomatoes because she just doesn’t like them in her gumbo. She added the bay leaves and both rotisserie chickens, but no hot sauce because “It’s not my goal to burn people out.” You could add some small slices of okra, which also acts as a thickener.
As the minutes ticked by, Ball added a dash of cayenne pepper, some black pepper and salt. She did have a helper on hand preparing roux from scratch, which she added toward the end.

At one point she plucked out a chicken bone and noted, “People who’ve never eaten gumbo are sometimes shocked by bones in the soup.”

You can add oysters or sausage at the end, if you want. Voila: 30-minute gumbo! All you need to go with it is some long-grain rice. “To make it pretty,” sprinkle some chopped green onions and parsley on the top.

Then the lanky songstress prepared an even speedier shrimp remoulade.

She took a plate of lettuce and added some slices of avocado. “This avocado probably cost $5,” she noted. “It’s the most beautiful avocado I’ve ever seen.”

She piled some steamed shrimp atop the green bed.

She took a jar and filled it with ingredients for the dressing:

1 cup vegetable oil
1/3 to 1/2 cup vinegar
1 jar creole mustard (which is dense and brown but wasn’t around, so she used stone ground instead)
2 tablespoons paprika
some finely chopped onion and garlic
horseradish (optional)
Tabasco sauce (although “you don’t have to”)

Then she screwed the lid on the jar. “I don’t have a food processor,” Ball said. So she shook that jar with some serious hip motion and sang, “Shake it up baby, come on twist and shout.”

Hmm, the dressing looked a little thin. Maybe she should have used less oil.

To compensate, she added more mustard. The dressing looked good. Her advice: “Don’t skimp on the mustard. It’s the predominant flavor.”

Also: “Salt and pepper wouldn’t hurt it.” And just for good measure, she added a heaping teaspoon of horseradish.

The dressing was a beautiful shade of tan. She poured it on the plate of lettuce, avocado, and shrimp. And there you have it:
Shrimp remoulade!

If you want to try Ball’s girlhood dessert, take some buttered white bread and dip it in a saucer full of syrup. “Boy, I feel old,” she said, describing the sweet treat. “It’s like from another world.”

Oh, and no matter what you cook, you might want to follow the advice of a friend of Ball’s mother. If asked for a recipe, she’d always say, “First you wash your hands.”

Ball closed her session with a joke that shows how Cajuns will cook just about anything. Two Cajuns see a UFO land, and some odd-looking creature gets out. One Cajun asks, “Now what’s that?”

The other one says, “I don’t know, but make some rice.”

- Marc Silver

Marcia Ball will be cooking on two fronts this weekend at the Smithsonian Folklife Festival in Washington, D.C. On Saturday night and Sunday afternoon, the award-winning rhythm-and-blues singer/pianist will represent her native Texas with several musical performances and a couple of cooking demos. Pop Omnivore will be there and promises to post her recipes for “emergency gumbo and shrimp remoulade”—ready in half an hour, Ball says. Here’s what the lanky Texan had to say about music, food, and life after Katrina.

You’re part of the delegation representing the culture of Texas. What is Texas music?

Texas music is as big as Texas itself. All the influences that make up the music of an entire country come to play in Texas. We have Cajun and Czech and Mexican and some of the roots of the blues and soul music and rap and, of course, western swing and cowboy music.

There are Czechs in Texas?

There’s tons of Bohemians and Czechs here in Texas. We have a huge polka crowd. The Germans came to Texas in one of the first migrations, in the 1830s. They also came to Mexico, which is why Mexico has such good beer (and why Mexico has a great beer called Bohemia). They brought the accordion with them when they came. And the accordion came from Mexico up through Texas to New Orleans.

What makes your music Texas?

I represent the Cajun culture that doesn’t stop at the [Louisiana] state line but is very strong all the way into east Texas and all the way to Houston.

You’ve got a lot of New Orleans in your music.

I grew up listening to Fats Domino and Huey “Piano” Smith and all the great stuff that came out from New Orleans, and my grandmother was a ragtime player from Lafayette.

Did you study piano?

I took lessons when I was a kid, but like everybody else I quit when I was about 14. I started chasing boys and playing sports and stuff. Then I got into a rock-and-roll band, and after a while started playing piano.

You’ve often classified as a blues pianist, but your music isn’t at all down and out.

It’s New Orleans–style rhythm and blues; it’s got that energy and jump to it.

Your new album is called Peace, Love & BBQ. How come “barbecue” is up there with “peace” and “love”?

The song is about home, about country, about family—about anything you do in the yard where friends and family gather and eat and play music.

Do you have any secrets to making good barbecue?

Oh yeah—I let my husband do it! That’s my secret. My husband is the true cook and true foodie in this family. You know two-alarm chili? My husband’s father, Wick Fowler, started it.

Like many musicians from the Gulf Coast, you wrote a song, “Ride It Out,” that alludes to Hurricane Katrina on your new CD. But isn’t it time to move on?

Those people are still in distress. It’s not over, and we don’t need to move on; we need to move on it. I’m going to play with Tab Benoit and the group he calls Voices of the Wetlands at the opening of the Democratic Convention to address the need to restore our wetlands, to turn attention to the fact that they’re critical to the security and safety of our coastal country, and to our food and our resources. If you like shrimp, eat ’em now [unless] we do something about the wetlands.

Are you unhappy with the government’s response?

For the last eight years, [we’ve had] a government that doesn’t seem to much care about its people. I don’t know if you want to get me started on that.

-Marc Silver