A while ago Benn loxo listener extraordinaire, Fabian, sent me a vinyl rip of the Western Jazz Band’s album, Vigelegele.

I’ve had so much listening to catch-up on that I only got to it today.. and it’s amazing. I’d heard the first track, Rosa, before but it’s the the last track on the B-side, the one you’ll hear today, that blew me away.

The slight echo and distortion on the guitars gives this album’s music a special quality.

You might have already heard some Western Jazz Band from another album back in August when I did a post about Original Music’s Dada Kidawa, Sister Kidawa compilation.

You might have also heard them over at Steve Ntwiga’s great site - he posted a track from this album a couple months ago. Steve: I imagine we’re both on Fabian’s mailing list.

Sorry there’s no purchase link, but I think that this album has been out of print for quite some time and hasn’t been reissued.. yet.

Maybe I’ll see some of you tonight, maybe not, but regardless I hope you all have a good weekend. I think I’ll take a break for a couple days. See you Monday.

ps- Thanks, Fabian.

Western Jazz Band - Wana Saboso

Wow, busy week. Feeling a bit tired this morning. A little Zambian “you’ve done me wrong” acoustic by George Kazoka lifts me out of bed and into my mug of coffee.

Today we’ll hear music from yet another Original Music release that explores the various forms of music that were spawned by the acoustic guitar as it spread across Africa: Guitar Songs From Tanzania, Zambia & Zaire.

You know, I never was good at the guitar. Something about stringed instruments has always eluded me. Piano, percussion, horns, no problem. But for whatever reason my fingers could never quite work the frets the way they should. It’s a shame, really, because it’s such a portable and almost universal instrument. In my next life, I guess.

George Kazoka - Ulayinda Kubota

C’est vrai qu’on est assez loin du Congo.. but you could feel a little closer this Friday if you show up at the Heat Me Party at the Cannibale Café. I’ll be playing some African classics there from about 11:30pm until closing. If you’re in Paris this weekend stop by 93, rue JP Timbaud in the 11th.

If you can’t make it, pour yourself a little Bas Armagnac, get a fire going and throw on today’s Bantous de la Capitale track. It’s a little reminder that there’s much more to life than Lisie.

Bantous de la Capitale - Loin du Congo

One of my favourite strands of music from across the African continent is a variety of styles that employ the European acoustic guitar. Original Music’s compilation, African Acoustic: Sounds Eastern and Southern, as the name implies, explores just that in eastern and southern African countries.

My two favourite tracks are both from the East so we’ll hit some southern acoustic another day.

The first is by the Kikuyu Kenyan duo, Peter Kimuri and Patrick Roy Roger. The track’s title apparently translates into “Kirinyaga is Our Good”, refering to a legendary tribal founder.

The second track is by Somalian steel guitar player, Amin Xaaji Maxamed. We don’t get to hear Somalian music too often, and Maxamed’s oud-like guitar playing and Arab-influenced singing is great.

Patrick Roy Roger & Peter Kimuri - Kirinyaga Ni Igai Retu
Amin Xaaji Maxamed - Dakhtar

Nacio Makanda’s growling on the track Kerestina sounds like I feel this Monday morning. A pinch of grumpy, a dash of missing the weekend, with its beer, fish and wine.

Another Original Music post today on my quest to post it all. Today’s tracks come from the 30th OM release, Kerestina: Guitar Songs Of Southern Mozambique 1955-1957. It doesn’t get much more niche than that.

I’ve always liked music from Mozambique and the songs on this release are no exception. Easy going and jangly, plus I love the sound of the languages spoken in that part of the world.

Mozambique is on my places to visit short list so hopefully I’ll be able to bring you more Mozambican music first hand sometime in the future. In the meantime, five bucks to anyone who can pronounce the first track’s name five times fast.

Mahikwani Makhuvele - Hayilolosa Amale Ye Matshangana
Nacio Makanda - Kerestina

Konomo No. 1 are a great band to see live. The driving rhythms, on-stage dancers and general charisma of the group make for a great show.

I first saw them in Paris two and half years ago, then again at the Couleur Café that summer.

If you’re lucky enough to have a good audience around you as I did on both occasions their shows turn into big dance parties.

Konomo made a splash when they first hit the international scene, particularly in the burgeoning audioblog scene circa mid-2005. Since then the hype has died down a bit, but they’re still touring and releasing new stuff. Above all they’re still a great live act.

The generous people at Crammed recently sent me a live recording of their performance at the Couleur Café festival in Brussels, Belgium.

To the left, a shot of Belgium kids in the Couleur café 2006 audience.. sweaty dancing fun.

Konono No.1 - A.E.I.O.U

A couple tracks from another recent Rough Guide release: North African Café. As usual it’s a solid compilation, this time of music inspired by or coming directly from the café scene in North Africa and its outposts abroad.

Jean-Pierre Smadj is a French-Tunisian oud player who likes to mix up North African music. Today’s track is by his S.O.S. project, a collaboration between Smadj, Orhan Osman and Savas Zurnasi. It reminds me a lot of early Gotan Project.

Akli D is an Algeria-born, Berber musician who also likes to mix it up a bit, combining shaabi music and other Kabyle sounds with a variety of styles. Parisian readers might remember his group Les Rebeuhs Des Bois.

Manu Chao produced his latest album, Ma Yela, where today’s track comes from. I’ve been meaning to see him live for a while now but I’m never free when he’s playing. Soon, soon..

Smadj presents S.O.S. Project - Hat
Akli D - Barman

A few days ago we heard some 1960s highlife from Lagos.

Following the Nigerian civil war, or Biafran war for independence, depending on your history book, juju replaced highlife as the dominant musical force in Western Nigeria. While there were still a few Yoruba highlife musicians left in Lagos the dominant Igbo highlife stars had left town and juju musicians like Ebeneezer Obey were taking over.

Original Music’s 37th release, Lucky Stars Rosy Mornings, explores the exploding juju scene in Nigeria’s second city, Ibadan, located in western Nigeria, during the 1960s.

The compilation is filled with scratchy, lovely tunes that remind us how juju sounded before it sped up and got whacked over the head with a synth during the 1980s.

Professor Sunny Agaga & his Lucky Stars Band - Olorun Lomo Ola
F.A. Jimmy West & his Rosy Morning Band - Ijesha Ile

Long-time readers of Benn loxo will know that I have a thing for small, relatively unknown islands. Particularly those with a shaky or undefined political status. Rodrigues, Réunion, Seychelles, The Comoros.. and other places the late Bob Denard may have deposed a president.

You’ll imagine my smile, then, when a random playlist this morning turned up Oswin Chin Behilia, a singer/songwriter from the Netherlands Antilles.

These islands are nowhere near Africa, but hey, neither are Belize or Colombia. Plus they do share something in common with many African islands: good music, turbulent politics, and frequent change of ownership.

By December 2008 the Netherlands Antilles will no longer exist.

Oswin Chin Behilia is from the island of Curaçao which will become an autonomous nation within the Dutch kingdom along with Sint Maarten. Aruba pulled the same trick back in the 80s. The remaining islands, Saba, Bonaire, and Sint Eustatius, will be folded into the Netherlands around the same time - they’ll essentially be considered part of the Netherlands as “special” municipalities. Special, meaning everything but Dutch social security and a toleration for prostitution and homosexuality. Baby steps, I guess.

My question to Oswin: does this mean he’ll lose his knighthood from the Queen of the Netherlands?

Either way, hope you enjoy the music. He’s been playing music since the early 60s and continues to tour today so check him out if he ever comes through your town.. or just grab the album over at Calabash.

Oswin Chin Behilia - Bendishon Disfras

Easy-going, jangly palmwine guitar for a mid-week post.

On his Original Music release, African Elegant - Sierra Leone’s Kru/Krio Calypso Connection, John Storm Roberts explores the relationship between palmwine guitar music from Sierra Leone and Liberia and Trinidadian calypso brought to West Africa by sailors passing through Freetown in the late 19th century.

Ebenezer Calendar, the musician you’ll hear today, was called the “calypso king” in his native Freetown, Sierra Leone. He was the country’s most famous palmwine musician during the 1950s and, according to the liner notes, “seemed to be personally known to almost everyone in Freetown.” This made him an ideal candidate to sing about everyday life in the city, the core of any good krio/calypso/palmwine song’s lyrics.

Ebenezer Calender & his Maringar Band - Fire Fire Fire

I’m continually impressed by the Rough Guide African music compilations. One of their latest, The Rough Guide to African Blues, is another example of their well researched and wide-ranging musical surveys.

I’ll feature two tracks today off this compilation: the first from a “country” I’ve never featured on Benn loxo, Western Sahara. (If you’re unsure why I put quotation marks around the word “country” you better do some reading.)

Mariem Hassan’s voice is beautiful. She is a Saharawi, a Western Sarahan people who live in exile in neighbouring Algeria, born into a griot (igawen) family. Her brother plus two other musicians from the Tinduf refugee camp accompany her on the track, La Tumchi Anni, which translates to “don’t desert me.”

Our second track is by Ayaléw Mèsfin & Black Lion band who are from, as you probably already guessed if you’re listening to the track now, Ethiopia. He lives in the US now, but apparently his record shop back in Addis is still top for classic golden era Ethiopia rock and soul. We love that kind of thing here, you know.

Mariem Hassan - La Tumchi Anni
Ayaléw Mèsfin and Black Lion Band - Feqer Aydelem Wey

Did I tell you that I’m learning Spanish? A second visit to South America this summer confirmed my desire to one day live in Buenos Aires, or possibly Santiago.. or, hey, Colombia. Why not. Anyway, in honour of my (painfully slow, despite the French) adoption of a new language, let’s play some Colombian criolla music.. champeta, to be exact.

Benn loxo has a surprising number of listeners in Barranquilla, Colombia. Ok, not so many; there are three, as far as I know. But that’s more than I’d expect.

Benn loxo’s Barranquillan readers has sent me lots of music over the last year, mostly champeta, with a splash of cumbia here and there. Before you read any further you should check-out the wonderfully translated Wikipedia article on champeta. It’s clear to me now that the word champeta “makes reference to the knife, used in the work, in the kitchen and as defense and offensive weapon of this culture of he himself name.”

The African origins of champeta are immediately clear. Much of it sounds like a very slightly South Americanized soukous. It has a very different sound from the majority of South American styles, including the music by Belizean-African musicians that you might have heard here before.

The first couple tracks today come off a World Network release by Colombiafrica - The Mystic Orchestra, called Voodoo Love Inna Champeta Land. It’s a collaboration between Colombian champeta musicians and several well-known West African musicians, including members of Kékélé and Bembeya Jazz, Diblo Dibala, Rigo Star and others. Wow, that first song.

The second couple are reader contributed champeta tracks straight from the source. Unfortunately I don’t know who they’re by. Please let me know in the comments. Thanks, Fabian and Farid, for hooking us up with the artist names.

Respect to all the champeta fans out there who tune in to Benn loxo, and thanks for the promos and musical discoveries.

Colombiafrica / The Mystic Orchestra - Sambangole / Tres Golpes Na’ Mas
Colombiafrica / The Mystic Orchestra - Mini Kusuto
Dogard Disc - Quedo En Las Tablas
Charles King - Echale Tierra

I’m determined to eventually get a post in for every single Original Music release. I know that many of you, or at least those who read often, may already have these albums, but bear with me. It’s a personal goal to collect and post a sample from every album in the OM catalog.

Today’s picks come from Original Music’s 17th release, Mbuki Mvuki. It’s a compilation of, in their words, “terrestrial hits from the catalog”. So if you’re not into running around, collecting every release, this album is a good sampler of much of what the label offered.

According to the liner notes, Mbuki Mvuki is Bantu for “to shuck off one’s clothes in order to dance.” I don’t know about you, but that’s what we’re doing here in our Paris apartment this sunny Saturday morning.. dancing, possibly with some by-request Diana Ross thrown into the mix, coffee in hand.

Three of my favourite tracks off the compilation from Ghana, Tanzania and Nigeria. Enjoy your Sunday.

Professional Uhuru - Madzi Me Sigya
Salim Abdullah - Wanawake Wa Tanzania
New Star Orchestra - Olefaya Loko

I revived Benn loxo with some Nigerian 70s rock courtesy of Soundway yesterday, so we’ll continue along a similar path with another in my long series of Original Music posts.

Today’s tracks come off one of my favourite Original Music releases that I’ve heard to date, Azagas & Archibogs - The Sixties Sound Of Lagos. The compilation features a collection of Nigerian Igbo, Yoruba and other highlife groups from Lagos. The songs have been (slightly) remastered from 45rpm records released during the early to mid-1960s.

It’s interesting to hear some good Yoruba highlife from this period, before Juju and Afrobeat took over. Most of the Nigerian highlife I know is from the Igbo east of the country, a region that for me, maybe aside from Ghana, produced Africa’s best music during the 1960s. However, it’s clear after listening to this compilation that Lagos’ Yoruban groups definitely had a good thing going as well.

Charles Iwegbue & His Archibogs - Okibo
Eric Akaeze & His Azagas - Adunni

I’m back, again. This time from a couple weeks in Canada for my brother’s wedding. Congrats, Ben.

And what better way to return than with some Nigerian 70s rock. That’s what this web site is all about, after all. Remember the beginning?

Today’s tracks come courtesy of the good people at Soundway Records. You should all know and love their Ghana Soundz releases, plus Afro-baby and that great TP Orchestre Poly-Rythmo release put together by Miles Cleret.

Soundway have a new double-disc compilation coming out in a few days called Nigeria Special: Modern highlife, afro-sounds and Nigerian blues, 1970-6. Pre-order now - fantastic hard-to-find classics, nicely cleaned-up.

This quote from the liner notes sums up the sound: “The early to mid-70s was the last time you could step out in Lagos, Onitsha, Enugu, Kaduna, Jos or Port Harcourt and see both old-style highlife bands dessed in crisp, matching suits; and then leave and visit a club up the road with young bands in their early twenties, dressed in Cuban heels, T-shirts and flares, and playing psychedelic rock and pop songs.”

ps - check-out the fansite at http://nigeriaspecial.info.

The Hykkers - I Want A Break Thru
The Funkees - Akula Owu Onyeara
Semi Colon - Nekwaha Semi Colon