ethnic

Discovering musicians like Pandit Debashish Bhattacharya is an unutterable bliss. I remember the excitement of hearing Kadri Gopalnath for the first time, saxophones in Indian classical music! Lap slide guitarist Debashish Bhattacharya is even more satisfying (if that’s even possible), because slide guitar tops the greatest instruments list for me as well.

Kouyate brings modern influences as well as Western inspiration to “I Speak Fula”, the debut release of Next Ambiance, an imprint of Sub Pop! Guest appearances by Toumani Diabaté and guitarist Vieux Farka Touré and vocals by Amy Sacko.

.. Imagine the exuberance when our friends from World Circuit announced the posthumous sequel to Ali Farka Touré and Toumani Diabaté’s collaboration and sent us the single, Kala Djula.

Collaboration between Ozgur Uckan and me, in honour of Claude Lévi-Strauss who passed away recently aged 101. Features music from Brasil, Angola, Hawaii, Egypt & Cuba, more or less around the tropics, and almost exclusively sad.

On Khan’s death in 1997, South Asia women wailed and men wept as if a god had removed himself from the earth. And in a way one had, because Khan had made the rich religious poetry of the Sufi tradition even more magical, bringing words and music together in an ecstatic celebration of the divine. To listen to him was to hear the harmony of the spheres.

Used to have a few songs from this one and I think I even played one in previous undomondo shows, now I have the full release and it’s full of gold. Dating from the most lucrative period in music history the 60’s and the 70’s, it’s highly unlikely to be otherwise, anyway. Must get this one, piece of history I say!

The tried and tested desert blues formula of twanging guitars, complex beats and chanting still seems fresh; and the guitars would inspire a whole new generation of afropop, or fit in with the lo-fi stuff that’s coming out of US these days. Just listen to the closer Era Tasfata Adounia, where the last four minutes go into an amazing drone.

Tribecastan’s “Strange Cousin” is no artificial pipeline or Eastern Western cultural bridge bullshit, these guys are real freak scientists, clinically obsessed with strange “out-of-fashion” instruments and have a huge ear for cultural instrumentations.