Reviews

Vagabonde

Mar Seek

Hasn’t the world now heard every possible permutation of the nexus of bands that revolutionised Senegalese music in the 1970s,...

Reviewed in issue March/2014

Bamako Nights: Live at Bar Bozo 1995

Lobi Traoré

The late Lobi Traoré’s reputation as the wild maverick of the Malian electric guitar is based less on his recorded...

Reviewed in issue March/2014

Le Grand Kalle: His Life, His Music

Joseph Kabasele

Joseph Kabasele, better known as Le Grand Kalle, was a Congolese singer and bandleader, and his dance¬band were the first...

Reviewed in issue March/2014

Emmaar

Tinariwen

Those who saw Tinariwen at the Songlines Music Awards 2012 Winners’ Concert at the Barbican at the end of 2012...

Reviewed in issue March/2014

Angola Soundtrack 2

VARIOUS ARTISTS

This follow-up to 2010’s Unique Sound of Luanda trawls a similar time period. Subtitled Hypnosis, Distortion & Other Sonic Innovations...

Reviewed in issue March/2014

Africa Express Presents: Maison des Jeunes

VARIOUS ARTISTS

It was always going to be interesting to see how Damon Albarn’s Africa Express project would translate to the recording...

Reviewed in issue March/2014

Flor di Bila

Neuza

Cape Verdean musicians tend to go down one of two paths: one of interpretation, set on preserving musical forms from...

Reviewed in issue March/2014

Soutak

Aziza Brahim

Aziza Brahim was born in the refugee camps of Algeria, an exile from her homeland in what the Saharawis call...

Reviewed in issue March/2014

Round 2

Black Bazar

From the first notes this sounds like Nobel Prize material, if the committee ever decided that making people dance deserved...

Reviewed in issue Jan/Feb/2014

Mzansi

Wouter Kellerman

For his latest release, South African flautist Wouter Kellerman offers up a blend of music from around the world –...

Reviewed in issue Jan/Feb/2014