So it’s been a month since my last post. I’m back, I’m still here, the music keeps piling up.

Last weekend I got a bunch of my friends to join in a trip up to Clichy-sous-Bois, a suburb northeast of Paris, to see a Moroccan gnawa concert by Hmida Boussou. As many of you already know, Clichy-sous-Bois was the original flashpoint for the recent riot troubles in France. The point of the trip was then two-fold: to check-out this place so badly portrayed in the media as a centre of racial hatred and burning cars, and to listen to some great live gnawa music from down in Essaouira.

As expected, Clichy-sous-Bois’ downtown turned out to be a quiet little French town much like any other Parisian suburb. That said, we weren’t in the middle of the cités but as one Clichy-sous-Bois resident put it, “this isn’t Chechnya.” It’s actually a nice little place that’s a pain in the ass to access using public transport at night. The Boussou concert was part of the ongoing Afrocolor festival in the suburbs of Paris. I’ve been busy with work, life and travel so I haven’t been able to check-out any of the other shows, but the programme is impressive and the festival is quite well-organized.

The Gnawa are a sufi Islamic brotherhood from southern Morocco (around Marrakesh and Essaouira) who use music, rhythm and dance to heal and entrance their followers. Gnawa music has become sort of trendy in Western culture this last while which is why I ask myself, isn’t track 5 on the Cowboy Bebop sountrack a gnawa song? Does anyone know anything about it? Song posted below.

Anyway, the Hmida Boussou concert was great. He’s a well-known Gnawa musician back home and if my armchair Google research is any indication he commands a far-reaching and good reputation. At the show everyone was rockin’ out to the rhythms and an entranced fan or two even hit a trance and dropped to their knees on stage. Definitely worth the RER. I picked-up his CD called Les Fils de Bambara on the way out - don’t think you can buy it in stores.

Hmida Boussou - Les Fils de Bambara
Seatbelts - Musawe