Toumastin

These are hard times for the Tamashek people, as Andy Morgan, former manager of the mighty Tinariwen, makes distressingly clear in the liner notes to Tamikrest's second album. Drought, conflict, terrorism and unemployment, he writes, mean the Tamashek ‘seem less in command of their own territory and destiny than at any time since the arrival of the French army in the late 19th century. It's a bleak message that provides an important context for these 11 songs from Ousmane Ag Mossa and his young Touareg guitar band. This is the music of resistance, full of the blues-like quality that the Tamashek call assouf (longing or homesickness) and yet it is also infused with a defiant message of hope and love. This core aesthetic is expressed through the kind of killer desert groove now familiar following the success of Tinariwen. But in the hands of Tamikrest, it's delivered with a rock‘n’roll sensibility that should make this music readily accessible far beyond the stockade of African music enthusiasts.

In part this is due to the production of Chris Eckman, of the American indie band the Walkabouts, who met Tamikrest in Mali in 2008 and also produced their debut, Adagh. It was at Eckman's suggestion that the sonic palette here has been expanded to include organ and viola, instruments never previously heard on a Touareg album. The hypnotic dub of ‘Nak Amadjar Nidounia’, the acoustic folk-rock mesh of ‘Addektegh’, the psych-rock guitar attack of ‘Aratan N Tinariwen’ and the Afro-funk of ‘Tarhamanine Assinegh’ all suggest that while this a band defined by its desert roots, it is certainly not confined by them. It will be fascinating to hear if Tinariwen can top this when they return with their fifth studio album in August – or whether their younger kith and kin have overtaken them with this remarkable record.