Sekouba “Bambino” Diabate got his name because he started singing with the famous Guinean group, Bembeya Jazz National, at the tender age of 17. This was a group of old guys by the mid-1970s and he was the nouveau talent, ie the little brat that the old-school members would make fun of. 30 years have passed and he’s still known as the baby/Bambino.

His last album, Sinikan, got a lot of attention, both in Africa and abroad. Well produced thanks to the studio work of some of Salif Keita’s team and well advertised/distributed, Sinikan was seen as an album that could finally get Guinean music on the map in Western markets. I’m not actually sure how well it sold abroad but regardless Sekouba is now well-known and seems set to rise in popularity.

He has that new-sound West Africa meets traditional and yet he stays true to his Mandingo/Guinean musical roots. While he’s a little heavy on the synth drums and casio sounds at times, his voice, the great chanting backup vocals and wonderful percussion more than save the music.

Here’s my favourite track off Sinikan (and no, it’s not “Fatou”) plus another tune from an earlier album that caught my ear on the Guinea Vibrations compilation.

And hey, since we now have some bandwidth to spare I’ll throw up another track off that compilation: some catchy Guinean dance music by another good traditional mandingo + pop fusion musician, Baba Djan. It’s Hallowe’en and I get the day-off tomorrow so may as well have something to move to tonight.

Sekouba Bambino - Gnangnini
Sekouba Bambino - Acanadia
Baba Djan - Kankan

After yesterday’s sweat-stained pop fest I think we should take a breath of fresh South African acoustic to change it up a bit.

A few posts ago I mentioned seeing Dave Matthews looking really timid beside the salsa kings, the Orchestra Baobab, at a concert in Dakar. Did you know he was South African? I didn’t until today to be honest. I also didn’t know that Vusi Mahlasela is signed to his label… and so it goes.

Despite this connection my educated guess is that Vusi and Dave didn’t really share the same childhood. Vusi Mahlasela grew up in a township outside Pretoria, the capital of apartheid South Africa. He started his musical career playing a home-made tin can and fishing wire guitar, eventually emerging as one of South Africa’s most famous musical artists and a major revolutionary voice against the white apartheid governement.

What’s interesting about Vusi and many, many other South African revolutionaries is that they didn’t hold a grudge. When apartheid finally fell during the 1990s he along with powerful voices like Nelson Mandela were preaching reconciliation and forgiveness instead of bitter revenge. Vusi was both a revolutionary and a post-apartheid pacifist. Without respected artists like Vusi Mahlasela South Africa could very well have decended into brutal civil war, not only between whites and blacks but also between rival southern African tribes vying for control of the new nation. For these reasons I really respect him.

I respect his music, too. No matter how popular he gets or how many of you already know him he deserves a post. Two songs today: one from his wonderful Live at the Bassline album and another track off Wisdom of Forgiveness. The first track is my favourite version of a song about Mandela’s return after years in prison. The latter track features some beautiful mbube singing found in a lot of Vusi’s music.

ps- unfortunately the Bassline is now closed. Or at least it was last time I was in Jo’burg. A great shame, that.

Vusi Mahlasela & Louis Mhlanga - When He Comes Back (Live)
Vusi Mahlasela - Emigodini

Today we’re going to have our first guest posting.

Ben Curtis: AP Photo Editor for West Africa, good friend and one-time roommate. He’s traveled all around Africa from the palms of Zanzibar to the mortars of Liberia. Good guy, funny accent.

See, the kids here are into their own modern pop. They laugh at the old school much like kids back in the States laugh at their dads for listening to Steely Dan. So without further ado, here’s Ben with a pop-filled contemporary night-club hit straight from the depths of small-town Sierra Leone…

In the lexicon of entertainment hotspots throughout the world, the remote diamond-mining town of Koidu in eastern Sierra Leone, near the Guinean border, is unlikely to feature all that highly.

But it was there in June that I found myself for a few days with a colleague and in the course of our work there, ended up at one of the hottest nightclubs I have ever been to. Hot in every way.

The place was small and dark with no air-conditioning, no ventilation, no windows, and was packed with about a hundred Sierra Leoneans flailing about on the packed dancefloor as their condensed sweat ran down the walls of the sauna-like room. Within five minutes in that heat and humidity every item of clothing we were wearing, including our shoes, was drenched in sweat.

But we stayed. As oppressive as the heat was, the place rocked. The dancefloor was pounding with a mixture of young guys and girls out to lift themselves up from the desperation of the town, diamond dealers, traders, and a few shady-looking white “businessmen” types standing in the corner looking very out of place indeed. The common bond between all was the desire to dance ourselves stupid.

During my stay in Sierra Leone, all the nightclubs and radio stations were playing this song, and when the DJ put it on, the whole place was completely jumping. Sadly I never found out the name of it, or who it was by, but when I got back to Freetown I managed to find a copy on a homemade, unmarked CD in the streetmarket. I decided to call it “Tell me if you want me to go” based on the chorus.

If you want a feel of the area, I have a photo gallery called “Sierra Leone Diamonds” on my website - www.bpcurtis.com

-Ben

Tell Me If You Want Me To Go

I managed to forget that it was one of my best friends’ 25th birthday on Monday. To make it up to her here’s a post that I’m sure she’ll love. Meg, sama xarit, je te dédie ce poste dans l’espoir que tu le liras…

I was driving home yesterday and saw a guy pushing a wheelbarrow filled with coconuts wearing a 50-cent t-shirt. Something was different. 50-cent was there looking at me all faux-ghetto but underneath his picture it said “50 CFA” - CFA is the local currency in Senegal and 50 CFA is worth about 8-cents US. I laughed so hard I almost fell off my scooter.

In honour of this wonderful t-shirt (and Meg) I thought I’d post one of the many cheesy Wolof covers of 50-cent’s repertoire. Here’s mbalax and Senegalese RnB star Viviane (the arguably sexy sister of Youssou N’Dour, no less) with PBS Radikal on a track called “Yaay Baign”, which doesn’t mean P.I.M.P. in Wolof.

We’ve also had requests for Daara J. Since I’m posting Senegalese rap anyway I’ll tack on my favourite track by this talented Dakar hiphop group off their 2003 album, Boomerang.

ps- that picture isn’t of the 50 CFA guy. I took it about 2 years ago when I first got to Dakar.

Viviane & PBS Radikal - Yaay Baign
Daara J - Boomerang

I promised some more grunting funk today, so here it is. Fresh-off the 8th volume of the popular Ethiopiques series, Swinging Addis, here’s Ethiopia’s Alemayehu Eshete sounding like he’s too-hot-can-you-handle-the-funk?

Volume 9 of the Ethiopiques series is devoted entirely to the man. He’s a big deal in Ethiopia or at least he was during 60s and 70s, otherwise known as the golden age of Ethiopian pop. People call him Ethiopia’s answer to James Brown and I wouldn’t disagree. Apparently he preferred Elvis over James Brown, but we’re lucky that the latter king influenced his music far more.

I’ve seen a few blogs post tracks off Ethiopiques albums lately but I thought I’d add a little context to the music. In the late 60s and early 70s the emperor of Ethiopia, Ras Tafari Makonnen aka Haile Sellassie, was at his peak. One of his many reforms was to relax state regulations that limited music sold and broadcast to “traditional” forms. This created a mini-boom in new Ethiopian pop music. The radios started putting black American music on heavy rotation and a whole generation of aspiring Western-style pop/soul/funk musicians was born.

I’ve also included another Ethiopian classic soul-funk tune by the Alemayno Eshirtay Group. I don’t know much about this tune other than it comes from the same era and I like it. Feel free to fill in the blanks with a comment.

Alemayno Eshirtay - Love is Love
Alemayehu Eschete - Tchero Adari Nègn (I Get By On My Own)

I started this site out with some old-school West African pop rock. We’re way overdue for some more.

The Super Eagles from The Gambia (yes, the “The” is officially part of the country’s name) aren’t really a rock band. They’re more accurately a pop, soul, afrocuban, rumba, highlife and rock group from the jubilant West African 60s. The song I’ll feature today, however, could be summed up like this:

“There’s an oddity called Love’s a real thing that attempts to blend Beatles and Cream guitar riffs and reminds me of garage bands I was in as a teenager.” (ref)

Perfect.

The second song is an obscure 11-minute bit off a 1976 Malian 45. (Anyone have the B-Side, “Wanri”?) It’s by Moussa Dombia and his sister? wife? Mimi, and I promise that this isn’t the same Moussa Dombia aka Tiken Jah Fakoly. I love the soul grunts in this tune; they remind me of an Ethiopian funk tune that I might have to post tomorrow. And what’s with the freak-out at the 8th minute? Anyone understand Bambara? Classic.

You can thank one of our readers, sufi, for kindly passing these tracks my way. Both can be found on a compilation called “World Psychedelic Classics Volume 3: Psychedelic Sounds from West Africa”. Who knows where you can buy that one, but The Super Eagles track can also be found on a compilation of their music on Retroafric called Senegambian Sensation.

Super Eagles - Love’s a Real Thing
Moussa Dombia - Keleya (Keleya is a small region in Mali)

Highlife is synonomous with Ghana’s first years of independence. Like many other Africans, Ghanaians rallied around a musical genre in an effort to establish a new and unique identity after the fall of colonialism. Though contemporary highlife sounds nothing like the original highlife from the 1920s through 50s, the music has remained the unofficial national sound for decades.

Highlife originally had more of a big band sound as developed by the “King of Highlife”, ET Mensah. It mixed popular styles from the 20s through 40s like European foxtrot and Carribean kaiso with local rhythms and instruments. As it evolved with the trends and times highlife took on a more afro-cuban, soukous and soul sound, with the guitar increasingly taking the spotlight off the horn sections.

By the 70s “guitar band highlife” was the dominant form of the music. In 1973 at Tema’s Talk of the Town Hotel in Accra the band Sweet Talks was formed. It would prove to be the starting point for a number of future guitar highlife stars, among them the fast guitar star, Eric Agyeman.

In 1978 Agyeman released his classic album Highlife Safari. It would go down as one of the classics of the guitar band highlife genre.

Highlife has evolved since Agyeman but the soulful, simple sound of 70s highlife remains my favourite form of the music. Here’s a sample off Agyeman’s classic.

ps- I’m on the lookout for some ET Mensah and the Tempos. If you have any or know where I could find a good recording please let me know.

Eric Agyeman - Nea abe beto

Big thanks to all of you who have donated so far. We’re almost there, having already collected over half of what we need to get enough bandwidth and space to last us through 2005.

Geoffrey Oryema is pretty famous now and, to be honest, this made me hesitate a bit when I picked him for today. A lot of you may already know him but his first album, Exile, is still one of my favourites and merits at least a post.

The guy’s life story merits at least a post, too. Born and raised in Uganda, he had to flee the country in the trunk of a friend’s car in 1977 when he was 24. Up until then he had lived a privileged life by Ugandan standards since his father was a respected and powerful police chief who later went on to become the Minister of Natural Resources for the national government. Oryema is also a member of Uganda’s “warrior king” tribe and/or ethnicity, the Acholi, who had traditionally ruled much of what is now modern day Uganda for centuries.

Unfortunately, like so many others, his father was murdered in a mysterious crash most likely caused by everyone’s favourite dead African dictator, Idi Amin. Uganda was a mess and anti-Acholi sentiment was rife. When his father was killed Oryema had no other choice but to send himself into exile.

He’s still living in “exile” today, having been in Normandy since 1989. The French apparently once called him “Africa’s answer to Leonard Cohen.” I’m not so sure about that one, but regardless his music is beautiful, intelligent and often unique. This isn’t so surprising since Oryema grew-up surrounded by a very artsy family who exposed to him the riches of Ugandan art, music and theatre.

Geoffrey Oryema - Piri wango iya

Well, it’s October 22nd and you jags have managed to whip through about 39GB of 40GB available transfer bandwidth in a touch over 3 weeks. Looks like we’re going to have to make some changes if we’re going keep things up and running.

I want to try and raise $150-200 so that we can upgrade this site to 80GB transfer per month with 1.5GB storage. That’ll let me post 2-3 songs daily instead of 1 song Monday to Friday, keep a larger archive with more active song links, encode at good bit rates instead of 128kbps and generally not stress about bandwidth.

You’ll notice there’s a new donate button on the site at the top-right of every page. By clicking on it you can make easy and secure payments via Paypal.

If you can afford any kind of donation - even $1 to $5 would do - I’d greatly appreciate it. All donations will go towards a web hosting account upgrade. Any donations that push us over the $150-200 target will go straight into new music purchases. That way everyone wins.

I have no plans to include any advertising on this site and would rather, if anything, make it a community effort to expand the site. I also have no plans to make this a pay site. I love doing this and want to keep it open for everyone to enjoy.

So here’s to hoping that a generous few with some spare change can help me out a bit. The site will keep running in some form regardless of donations but how much bigger and better we get is up to you, the readers.

-Matt

The acoustic guitar trend continues…

Thanks to all those who replied to my request for some S.E. Rogie. Special thanks to Olivier for sending me a full album and the Avocado Kid for passing me a great tune that I’ll post here today. I wanted some Rogie because I’ve been really into palmwine guitar lately. See my post a couple of days ago about Palmwine Highlife.

Sooliman Rogie may be the most well-known artist from Sierra Leone in the 80s. He’s the kind of guy who recorded a song called “Dead Men Don’t Smoke Marijuana” just months before his own death in ‘94. Already we like him. He plays a mellow, fine guitar that would go quite well with a calabash of palm wine and some of that famous Sierra Leonian greenery.

From his 1975 debut album titled “African Lady” here’s some S. E. Rogie to finish up that bandwidth.

ps - This song is especially appropriate today because my own lovely African Lady just got back into town. Missed you, K.

S. E. Rogie - African Lady

Let’s stick with African acoustic guitar music for another post, but this time we’ll move ahead a few decades to Pape & Cheikh in present-day Senegal. My buddy Laurent grew-up with these guys in the Siné Saloum region of south-central Senegal. Supposedly they’re pretty nice, but either way they put on great concerts and I love their music.

They sound a lot like Youssou N’Dour crossed with Cheikh Lô, maybe with a pinch of Dave Matthews. (Incidentally, I saw Dave Matthews and Trey Anastasio play with the Orchestra Baobab in Dakar a few months ago for some VH1 special they were filming here. Trey held his ground on the guitar but Dave looked and sounded like a small child afraid of the mic, awkwardly sharing the stage with the uber-confident Senegalese salsa superstars.) Indeed, Pape and Cheikh themselves cite artists such as Bob Dylan, Cat Stevens and Joan Armatrading as musical influences for their music. They mix a folky Western protest feel with traditional serer rhythms and singing and come out with a very modern but still Senegalese style.

The duo’s political leanings are obvious in their lyrics. What some might not know, however, is that their hit song “Yatal Gueew” (Widening the Circle) available on their 2002 album, Mariama, was adopted by opposition leader Abdoulaye Wade as his campaign theme song in the 2000 Senegalese presidential elections. It’s a great tune about how efforts must be made to reunite Senegal’s diverse ethnicities and political bodies. And hey, Wade scored a come-from-behind victory in the elections so the song’s gotta be doing something right. Have a listen below.

Pape & Cheikh - Yatal Gueew

When made well, palmwine can be really, really good. Before you know it you’ve had a litre and suddenly standing up becomes a serious problem in the afternoon heat. The real good stuff is tapped directly out of the palm tree where it has already partially fermented and then mixed with a bit of fresh honey. Making me thirsty just thinking about it..

Before the electric guitar-infused world of highlife took English-speaking West Africa by storm in the early to mid-60s, a lighter, more acoustic style was en vogue. Palmwine jazz from Ghana, sometimes called palmwine highlife, was the precursor to highlife as most of us know it. It was very popular in its day, however a lot of the good recordings were either lost or pressed on now-unlistenable 78 vinyl.

Between 1983 and 2000 Accra-based producer and musician Professor John Collins got together three of Ghanaian palmwine highlife’s greats and recorded their music at his 4-track Bokoor Studios. Kwaa Mensah, Koo Nimo and T.O. Jazz all laid down some great songs, this time recorded in quality conditions.

The result of these recordings is the fantastic 2003 album Vintage Palmwine.

ps- I’m looking for music by Sierra Leonians S.E. Rogie and Abdul Tee-Jay . I can’t seem to find their albums in Dakar. Anyone up for a trade?

T.O. Jazz - Waytime Ama
Koo Nimo - Dabre Obia Awuo (When you die someone will not sleep)

Lately I’ve been on Zimbabwe kick if you haven’t noticed. While indulging in this latest craving I stumbled upon George Sibanda, arguably the first music star in sub-Saharan Africa. He was famous from South Africa to Kenya during the late 40s and early 50s. In newly industrialized African countries he spoke to labourers with his simple lyrics about common problems sung over folky, jangling acoustic guitar.

What’s really funny (or sad) about this “superstar” is that no one ever took his photo and no one is exactly sure when he was born or when we died. If you look at the liner notes of a recently released collection of his music you’ll find pictures of the things he sings about but none of the man himself.

George Sibanda plays really, really happy music. Cute, even. Despite all this happiness, however, he managed to drink himself to death by the late 50s (like any good music star). Before this unfortunate end he played innumerable gigs up and down southern Africa for cash and drinks. During his travels he bumped into Hugh Tracey, a white Rhodesian passionate about recording African musicians, and put down a bunch of tunes, two of which you’ll find below.

The Hugh Tracey recorded album I’m referring to, The Legendary George Sibanda, is highly recommended. It’s well produced and perfect for a Sunday hangover or a Wednesday-night poker match.

George Sibanda - Guabi Guabi
George Sibanda - Dali Ngiyakuthanda Bati Ha-Ha-Ha

During the late 1970s and early 1980s the famous band from Zaire, Zaiko Langa Langa, was in serious trouble. Key members were defecting due to infighting and Papa Wemba’s efforts to steer the group in controversial new directions. The product of all this fighting, however, were several splinter groups that rose from the ashes of the formerly great Zaiko.

One of the better and more successful forks was the Langa Langa Stars. They were started by Isifi Lokole and Yoka Lokole of Zaiko and only lasted from 1981 to 1984. During this time, however, they became legendary, thanks to their amazing 7-part male vocals. The lead vocalists, led by Evoloko Jocker, called themselves the “7 Patrons” (seven bosses or chiefs) of Langa Langa Stars.

I think that the song I’ll post today is by the Langa Langa Stars as led by Evoloko Jocker, former vocalist for Zaiko Langa Langa. One of my readers, Bill, sent me this great tune in hopes that I’d be able to identify it and then post it so that others could help him on his quest to find more like it. If I’m wrong in my guess please let me know.

As far as other albums like it, I suggested this one. Wonderful harmonies.

Evoloko Jocker and the Langa Langa Stars?

The mbira isn’t just an instrument. For Zimbabweans it’s traditionally used in ceremonies to connect with their ancestors so that they can offer advice and guidance. It’s used in something like southern African trance music, a repetitive chiming over light percussion and sometimes a bit of chanting. Traditionally used by the Zezuru tribes of the Shona people, it has 22 to 28 keys mounted on a wood soundboard. The instrument is then placed in a gourd so that the sound can resonate.

Girls aren’t supposed to play mbira; it’s traditionally a guy-only deal in Zimbabwe. Women who pluck the metal with their thumbs are called “loose” and criticized or rejected by their community. Stella Chiweshe didn’t care. She was determined to “talk” mbira no matter what and went on to become the most well known player of the instrument outside the country.

Chiweshe first picked-up the mbira in 1964 and by 1974 had released a hit-single. She went on to record numerous singles and albums before leaving the trouble that is present-day Zimbabwe. She now lives in Germany where she still plays and records.

Today’s track is off her latest album, Talking Mbira, and is a good example of the simple, repetitive and beautiful sounds that you find in her music.

Stella Chiweshe - Huvhimi

Alright. It’s time to answer some of those requests. First up, Super Mama Djombo.

Guinea Bissau borders the country I live in but unfortunately I’ve only ever looked at the border and never actually crossed it. Last time I was in south-western Senegal there were reports of banditry on the road I would’ve had to take across the border so I didn’t take the risk. This is no surprise since Bissau is a somewhat lawless place and one of the absolute poorest nations on the planet. It must also be the unsuccessful coup attempt capital of the world.

You can blame a lot of this on the Portuguese, Africa’s foremost crappy colonials, who didn’t let go of the country until 1974. Another reason that things are so bad there is a brutal civil war that happened in 1998-99 to unseat the country’s just as crappy as the Portguese if not worse dictator, Joao Vieria. Since then there’s been another coup and recently a mutiny of sorts. Things aren’t exactly looking up.

But man, oh man, in 1974 people were pumped for freedom. The group that sums up this spirit - in fact the group that pretty much was this spirit as embodied in its music - is Super Mama Djombo.

They only got one chance to properly record their music when in 1980 they went up to Lisbon and recorded something like five albums worth of songs and produced one full-length LP in a very short period of time. Suddenly they were African superstars. But then, like all other hopes in Bissau since independence, they gradually faded away after the 1980 coup that started another slow decline of their beloved country.

Their hit self-titled album was remastered and rereleased in 2003. One of the songs on that album, Pamparida, is said to have caused several spontaneous riots when played in public places. I’ve also posted a second track that I like because when it breaks I get shiver down my spine.

Super Mama Djombo - Pamparida
Super Mama Djombo - Pansau Na Isna

Judging by the over 25GB you’ve downloaded so far in October and the many e-mails I’ve received, people seem to like this site. Thanks - I appreciate it.

I’ve received a couple hesitant requests over the last few days. Requests are more than welcome. They give me some direction and ideas when I go music shopping at the markets and sometimes introduce me to bands I might not otherwise buy or know. For those who have already requested, I haven’t forgotten about you: some Zaiko Langa Langa, Super Mama Djombo and late-70s Thione Seck is on the way; I found them at the market yesterday and will be posting them this week or next.

I always appreciate comments or e-mail and am open for trades, requests or suggestions. Cheers.

I was poking around Amazon last night and stumbled upon a couple of amazing free MP3 downloads by the Mthembu Queens of South Africa. I don’t know much about this group except that they’ve released only one album, Emjindini in 1989, and that they play a kind of South African pop music called mbaqanga.

The second song listed, Wadiliza Umuzi, is particularly great. Listen about half-way through the song when the male lead almost descends into a fit of throat singing.

http://artist.amazon.com/mthembuqueens

I watched the debate last night because I get to vote in this year’s US election thanks to a brief stint in Michigan from the age of 0-3. The debate left me feeling better about Kerry but quite sour about American politics in general.

So in honour of my home and greater land, Canada, I thought I’d post a track by a Canadian-Guinean today. The choice is especially appropriate this week since Canada recently decided to completely forgive debts owed by the world’s poorest nations, many of them in West Africa.

Alpha Yaya Diallo was born in Guinea-Conakry but now lives in the land of rain and Starbucks, Vancouver. While still in Guinea he played with the popular Bembeya Jazz National band. Before moving to Canada he spent some time in Amsterdam where he joined Fatala on Peter Gabriel’s Real World label.

Diallo’s guitar playing is great and despite his deep-rooted Western influences he still manages to produce a music distinctly and authentically West African. And in a distinctly and authentically Canadian way this new resident was awarded the country’s highest musical honour, a Juno, for his album The Message in 1999.

Here’s a track from that album. I’ve also included a track today by Diallo’s old group, the Bembeya Jazz National, that I particularly like.

Alpha Yaya Diallo - Badenma
Bembeya Jazz National - Mami Wata

Oops, did I say that this site was all about West African music? Wait, wasn’t it Senegal week? Forget about it. Some guy on a moped cut me off on the way to work today so forget Senegal. In fact, forget West Africa. We’re heading south today where we’ll find some rock n roll meets traditional Zimbabwe.

Regardless of which colour is ruling the country, Zimbabwe seems forever entrapped in dictatorships and misfortune. It just can’t get it together despite being one of Africa’s potentially richest nations. Racial hatred, power-hungry oligarchs and widespread corruption continue to cripple the country.

Activists like Thomas Mapfumo have taken the constant struggle that your average Zim national faces and turned it into a form of music. He mixes traditional Shona mbira music with politics and Western sounds to come up with his own musical style, chimurenga, which means ’struggle’ in Shona.

Mapfumo, the “lion of Zimbabwe”, is an amazing musician. He tours often so you may be able to catch a live show. In the meantime give the tracks below a listen. You can find both of them on the excellent best-of album, Chimurenga Forever.

Thomas Mapfumo - Hwahwa (beer)
Thomas Mapfumo - Zvandiviringa (I am in trouble)