Moyo

Papillon, a multi-instrumentalist and singer from Kenya, has a goal to reclaim musical traditions that were lost during the bloody and devastating colonisation of Africa. He began his musical career in a band called Juakali Drummers, who toured Europe. Now, it seems, he's moved on to something much more relaxed and pensive. The opening string samples, accompanied by the ‘doom-doom’ of a heartbeat, create a setting for Papillon's pitch-perfect, soft voice on the opening track ‘Cinoma Ofwneke’. The melodic qualities here and his tone of voice bring UK pop singer Seal to mind. ‘Dream’ is gorgeous, a multi-layered sung passage leads into gentle acoustic guitar, a lamellophone (probably, according to the press release, of Papillon's own making), gentle shaker and flute. The overarching musical texture of this album consists of sensitively blended acoustic instruments including tabla, guitar and nyatiti (harp), MIDI string samples (which there could be less of) and multiple vocal tracks.

Papillon's gentle and quietly confident songs are complemented with contrasting arrangements and timbral combinations, but this reviewer would prefer less MIDI string atmospherics so these delicate tunes could breathe. The sleeve notes contain invaluable lyric translations, which reveal absolute poetry.