Masterminded by Sheer Publishing, better known for placing African-authored songs in homegrown films like Tsotsi and District 9, this triumvirate of samplers takes the pulse of contemporary West African music. How much of it will be of interest to Songlines readers is a moot point. The throbbing, skeletal xalam (lute) and flute mantra of King Ayisoba’s ‘Africa’ is probably worth the price of the Ghana Awake Vol 1 disc alone, though – along with perhaps Fallysa’s ‘Tounou’ – it’s one of the few pieces of new music from a young artist here that actually does justice to the continent’s dance-floor heritage. Sure, for every Euro-cheese-gobbling romp like Moustapha Tata’s ‘Wei Yo’, Wax Dey’s ‘Make Love’ or Group of Afafa’s ‘Djawa’, there’s a Beninese acoustic guitar-and-percussion meditation of the measure of Jolidon Lafia’s ‘Bella’, or an elegant piece of Afro-jazz from Manu Dibango/Miles Davis collaborator Sissy Dipoko. The Cameroon instalment, in particular, however, makes for disheartening listening. Mel Nova at least attempts to blend his rhyming with a more organic kwaito and makossa cocktail, the overall sound is a fairly slavish imitation of insipid, gratingly auto-tuned R&B and hip-hop from across the Atlantic. There’s light relief in the form of Golden Sounds’ ‘Zangalewa, a welcome if mystifying inclusion from 1986, wherein the cheap synths are at least partly redeemed by rousing makossa rhythms and military brass. Even most of the highlife-heavy Ghanaian disc is largely forgettable and the much touted hip-life fusions aren’t exactly inspiring, and in fact sound even less impressive in the company of legends such as CK Mann, AB Crentsil and Paapa Yankson. With a few honourable exceptions, these compilations merely confirm the global homogenisation of commercial music production in the 21st century.