Africa
AFRICA-CUBA
Africando
Ketukuba
‘One of the African Dance Albums of the year’ according to Robin Denselow in the Guardian. It’s certainly that. Ketukuba translates as ‘from the origin to Cuba’ the origin being Africa of course...
GUINEA
Ba Cissoko
Electric Griot Land
Some albums repay more than a cursory listen and here you have one such. First time around the first track and half a dozen others grab you but the rest seem charming but a little light. However on second and third hearings the true quality grabs you. There’s a nod to Hendrix in the title and the sleeve notes make reference to ‘the post modern griot’ – all very ambitious – but overall Ba Cissoko and co pull off a bit of a triumph...
MALI
Toumani Diabate's Symmetric Orchestra
Boulevard de l'Independance
Yes, I can forgive this man for professing to be a fan of music by Phil Collins, Michael Bolton and (gasp) 70s German prog-rock dinosaurs The Scorpions. Why the benign forgiveness? Simply because the music which tumbles from Toumani Diabaté's fingers is some of the most sublime and ethereally beautiful you'll find if you search the world over....
MALI
Ali Farka Toure
Savane
Sadly Ali Farka Toure died on March 6 2006. Savane was his final solo album and the one that he thought to be his finest. His guitar and vocals are accompanied by the ngoni (a plucked lute) and the njarka (single stringed fiddle) as well as by the harmonica of Little George Sueref and the sax of Pee Wee Ellis. Ali Farka Toure was more than a musician. As a farmer and Mayor of Niafunke he put money earned from his albums into irrigation and development schemes, and his recent revival of interest in his music was born of a desire to ensure that young Malians were aware of their musical heritage...
Democratic Republic of Congo
Kekele
Kinavana
IT shouldn't come as too much of a surprise that these older statesman of the Congolese sound can whip up such an authentic Cuban atmosphere in their music. That they've been at it for upwards of three decades means these guys have a collective several centuries' experience when it comes to the rumba - Congolais or down-the-line Cuban-stylee. Not too amazing, either, that the group's creator and patron, the indefatigable Ivoirean producer Ibrahim Sylla, should wish to marry his two finest creations - Kékélé and the Afro-Latin supergroup Africando - in a project which carries our heroes into uncharted purist territory where they do not fail to shine...
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