Founders Alex Kasiek and Hamid Mantu had been working together in various bands, and at one time were in a group that played in the Middle East. After being exposed to different kinds of musics, they started to find the British music scene boring.

"We ended up looking for something different, says Alex. "We were using a lot of samplers, we were using our very primitive idea of Arabian music, just from listening to a lot of Arabic music and loving it but not really knowing what we were doing."

The group signed to Nation Records, a label that was trying to bring together dance with Arabic, Indian and other non-western music. It was through Nation that they met up with vocalist (and belly dancer) Natacha Atlas.

Part of Transglobal Underground's unique sound can be attributed to the balance between live instruments and electronics. A lot of dance acts would use sampling to create some of the exotic instruments sounds Transglobal Underground use, but the group prefers the real thing.

"Everything that sounds electronic is electronic, anything that sounds real is probably by a real person, " says Alex.

Over a dozen different musicians have collaborated with the trio in the studio and on stage. They usually only have five or six people on stage at once, but at some shows it has been double that.

"For some people who've heard the record, it suddenly comes together when they see us play live," explains Atlas. "It suddenly makes more sense that it did before. There's just no other show going around like us."

Transglobal Underground's latest album is called Psychic Karaoke" Alex and Hamid also produced Natacha's debut solo album, "Diaspora."