Guest post today by Benn loxo listener, Joop van der Linden.

Smiling Osei is a Ghanaian singer who’s been living in Holland for quite a few years now. I met him by accident, 8 years ago, and helped him producing a demo which was to become his first album.

This is a track from his second album “Wayo Tactics” which will be released by the end of june on the Dutch “Dakar Sound” label. On the record, you’ll hear musicians from Ghana, Mali, Congo (the former bass player for Franco and Rochereau), Senegal, and Holland. Myself, i am a trombone player and arranger/producer, and, together with Michiel Cornelisse who is an excellent engineer, we produced and arranged the album, myself viewing it from a musican’s perspective, he from a sound-engineer’s perspective, which is a great combination. On the album there’s quite some variation, we did some dance-kinda tunes, some true highlife-style, and even an african salsa.

The album is going to be released somewhere in May, on Dakar Sound records. If you are unfamiliar with the label, do check it out! They have (re-)released a true wealth of beautiful african music. Anybody who’s interested in hearing or knowing more, here’s my email-adress: joopvanderlinden@freeler.nl

cheers,
Joop

Smiling Osei - Happy Maker
Smiling Osei - Wayo Baby

I was in Italy for a week and half, baking in the Tuscan sun and exploring the Mediterranean coast. What a beautiful part of the world.

Anyway, sorry for not posting for a while but everyone needs the occasional vacation. Let’s launch right back into things with some heavy Sudanese rhythm from Setona.

Setona is a musician known as the “Queen of Henna”. She’s from Kordofan in western Sudan and is not only a musician but also a henna artist. Her hands and feet are always covered in wild streaks of tattoo patterns. Apparently Prince (as in The Artist Formerly Known As) once asked her to henna him up. I’m not sure if she accepted.

Setona’s music, sort of like her henna designs, is wild Sudanese-Moorish fusion, dominated by Eastern percussion styles and her piercing voice. Today’s track comes off her 1997 album, Tariq Sudan.

ps- I’m off to Belgium this weekend for the Couleur Café festival. Expect lots of photos and music from there next week.

Setona - Tarazina

Continuing with the Mali theme, today we’ll hear some old Salif Keita and Kante Manfila music. This year they released The Lost Album on the French label, Discovery. It’s an interesting collection of previously hard-to-find tracks recorded in 1980 in the Ivory Coast. Most of the songs were only available on Nigerian vinyl until they were found and polished up by Discovery.

What makes this collection cool is that it pre-dates the traditional music renaissance amongst West African musicians. While the track I posted today isn’t maybe the greatest example of this (even though it’s my favourite), most tracks are kora, balafon and guitar-based tunes with traditional melodies and rhythms. This kind of return-to-your-roots sound wasn’t in fashion in 1980. Instead, reggae, funk and pop dominated West African music. The fact that Keita and Manfila were producing this kind of album at the time further proves their status as true visionaries for the West African world music sound that has emerged in recent years.

Salif Ketia & Kante Manfila - Wara

First of all, thanks to Benn loxo listener Peter for introducing me to some great Senegalese bars and restaurants last night. Didn’t think I’d be drinking Castel and eating dibi haoussa so soon into my Paris move.

I’ve sort of been on a Mali kick lately. Why not stick with the Mande griot theme and post a few more…

The song we’ll hear today is by a female Malian griotte, Mah Damba. It’s off her 2000 album from Buda Musique, Djelimousso. Her impressive singing is backed up by her husband, Mamaye Kouyaté, on the ngoni. The ngoni is a lute-like instrument used by many Mande musicians in present-day Mali.

If you understand French you can read more about her here. I’d post more myself but it’s Friday.

Enjoy the weekend and the music.

Mah Damba - Koulan Kouman

As promised, here’s a track from Djelimady Tounkara’s great new album, Solon Kôno. Hear more of Djelimady’s music here and here. The photo on this post is a poor-quality phone camera shot from the concert on Tuesday.

Reading that old post brought back a wave of memories from my favourite vacation to date: overland from Dakar to Ouagadougou in February, 2003. In the town of Kayes near the Senegalese border I not only saw the aforementioned Malian blues show from the roof of my hotel, but also heard some beautiful kora while playing poker at a bar that afternoon.

I’ll never forget those kora players because a) it was about 50C outside, b) I was being schooled by a sly Ivoirian who’d just managed to get me a free train ticket after I’d been pickpocketed, c) they were playing for no one in particular, just killing time with beautiful music to wait out the afternoon heat.

The next day we caught a train to Bamako (that took only 14hrs), hung around for a day, then ended up somehow on a bus filled with Ivoirian refugees heading for Ouaga. We rode that bus for two straight days, getting lost on alternate routes followed to (unsuccesfully) avoid police controls and stopping for donkey brochettes and sleeps at border crossings.

Near Bobo Dioulasso - another great music city - we’d had enough of that bus so we hopped on another, rolling into Ouaga a dusty 3.5 days after leaving Dakar. Bribes, heat, repairs, love, hate and a midnight snack of fine Bordeaux and foie gras in the Malian bush. What more could one ask from a West Africa road trip?

Djelimady Tounkara - Téguindo

The trick worked. I got to the Malian concert at the New Morning last night and found someone almost immediately who sold me a ticket outside at face value. I got in with enough time to snag a good seat facing the stage - most people were left standing, craning to see the musicians.

What a show, and in general what a great week for live music - Saturday at Konomo, Sunday at the Parc Floral, last night for the Malian soirée and hopefully tomorrow for some Daara J. I’m still bummed I couldn’t get into Prefuse 73 on Monday, but I guess you can’t have it all.

I’d never seen Djelimady Tounkara nor Boubacar Traoré in concert before. They were both really impressive and a lot of fun. Djelimady started out, strumming through mostly newer songs off his last two albums. I was wrong yesterday, by the way - I’ve been so out of it with his move that I failed to notice that Djelimady has recently released a new album, Solon Kôno, that I’ll feature tomorrow.

Today I’m going to post something off Boubacar Traoré’s new album, Kongo Magni. Traoré has mellowed out over the years, moving from a rocking Malian guitarist style to a more subdued, bluesy feel. He dresses and dances like a friendly grandfather - full of smiles, good tunes and a raspy voice with a seldom used belting potential.

Something that adds a lot to the album is the addition of Vincent Bucher’s harmonica. This along with calabash percussion, kora played like an electric guitar, and acoustic guitar Malian-style all melds nicely into an original blues fusion. It’s so interesting to me how contemporary Malian blues has emerged. It now counts among my favourite sounds on the continent.

Boubacar Traoré - Horonia

I went to see Konomo No. 1 at the New Morning in Paris on Saturday night. What a great show. I don’t think I’ve rocked-out that hard since I was given backstage passes for Iron Maiden at Paris Bercy in 2001. Now that was epic.

The Konomo show had loads of energy, a good venue and a dancing crowd. I sweated it out for a good few hours on the dancefloor, stopping only momentarily for the occasional pint refill. Cheers to the random French guy who sold me a discounted ticket outside and let me skip the queue. I owe you one.

Tonight I may go check-out Djelimady Tounkara and Boubacar Traore, but I’m worried it might be sold out. Wish me luck. I wasn’t so lucky last night when I showed up late at the Prefuse 73 show hoping to get in. Either way, if you’re curious about Tounkara I wrote about him here and here. His latest album, Sigui, is fantastic.

Several music blogs have posts about Konomo, but no reason why I can’t spread some as well. I’ll throw in some Tounkara, too, in the hopes that brings me ticket love tonight. See here for some live clips from the Konomo show I saw.

Konono No. 1 - Ungudi Wele Wele
Djelimady Tounkara - Yamaryo

I know I promised something off the latest Amadou & Mariam album, but for whatever reason I’m just not in the mood.

Instead let’s listen to some Guinean afro-funk, Kaloum Star. The group was formed over 30 years ago by Mamadou Barry, but they didn’t get around to releasing an album until 1997. As far as I know this album, Felenko, is their only release.

It’s Friday and definitely time to get out of the office. I’m hopefully seeing Konomo No. 1 tomorrow so expect stories and music from that Monday.

Enjoy the sounds and have a good weekend.

Kaloum Star - Sarali

Again only time for a short post, but it’s the music that matters so I’m sure you’re over it.

I’ve posted Amadou and Mariam a couples times on this site already. They’re good, so why not some more. Something old today, then something from their latest album tomorrow.

Sete Djon Ye, from the 1998 Sonodisc release of the same name, is among my favourite Amadou and Mariam tunes. It was their second CD release, but actually just included brushed up copies of tracks previously released over the years on casette. I’m not sure where you can buy this these days actually so sorry for the lack of purchase link.

Blind Love by Emanon, as it happens, is one of my favourite hiphop songs. I think I’ll post that today, too. (In case you missed that one, both Amadou and Mariam are blind and they’re wildly in love with each other.)

Amadou & Mariam - Sete Djon Ye
Emanon - Blind Love