Afrobeat Tape 7 Items

No shortage of colorful characters emerged from Cameroon's bikutsi scene in the 1980's and early 90's. Gibraltar Drakus is one of the most enduring and enigmatic of the artists who helped transform bikutsi into a beautifully endless fabric of triplet rhythms that eventually reached ears around the world. Following the advent of Cameroon Radio Television in 1987, bikutsi began to supplant makossa and soukous for domination of the local airwaves and the attention of cosmopolitan, thrill-seeking residents of Cameroon's capitalYaoundé and beyond. Biktusi perfectly fused Beti traditional music and increasingly electronic, highly rhythmic guitar-based bikutsi. Mimicking the sound of village-based xylophone music by rigging a mute to electric guitar strings, bikutsi artists provided a relentlessly energetic dance format for those with a taste for music steeped in their hometown sensibility (countering the popular makossa that many felt sounded less indigenous). By the early 1990's, Les Tetes Brûlées were indisputably the most famous and influential artists in bikutsi, due in part to the innovations of their incendiary guitarist Théodore Zanzibar Epeme. Following their first European tour in 1987, the ba...

Roger Bekono made a deep mark in the contemporary history of Cameroonian music through the four-on-the-floor, ribald intensity of bikutsi. The Ewondo-language dance-pop style that forms an undulating tapestry of interlocking triplet rhythmic interplay came to international prominence in the European "world music" scene as the 90s began. But the relentless sound of bikutsi developed in Yaoundé at the hands of Bekono and many others, as it developed from a village-based singing style performed mostly by women into a cosmopolitan music force that rivaled the popularity of established musics like Congolese rhumba, merengue and makossa. With his unique- somesay suave-voice, Bekono contributed much over a period of more than10 years as part of the evolution of this traditional rhythm-turned-urbandance movement. Bekono worked with legendary producer Mystic Jim who had built a prolific home studio along with a crack team of musicians, who joined as part of the production of his self-titled album, which became known locally as Jolie Poupée, the name of the album's lead single and most popular song. For Jolie Poupée Mystic Jim programmed the kick or bass drum, adding effects to have a heavier bass. Overall the album represented a new level of finesse and professionalism for his second release. In the middle of 1989, Jolie Poupéewas released by the label Inter Diffusion System and aggressively hit the radio, discos and national television. The music video for the title track was on loop on TV. It felt like everyone was talking about it, even artists in adjacent music scenes like makossa. The album came out on vinyl and cassette and remains Bekono's best-selling recording to this day. With Jolie Poupée Bekono finally made an impact outside Cameroon as the record captured listeners in some Central African countries like Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, Republic of Congo and Sao Tome & Principe. In these countries, we find the Fang or Mfan people(also known as Ekang), Bantu-speaking ethnic groups that are also found in Cameroon....

Coming from the city of Gao, on the edge of the Saharan desert,Malian producer Baba `'Babsy'' Konate is one of the key figures in thedevelopment of "Gao Rap", a regional genre of modern autotunedSonghoi music.Tounga is Babsy Konate's debut mixtape, collecting a decade oftracks that merge sweet autotuned vocals, crunchy drum loops andplucked digital harpsichord, in a playful testament to 2000s PC music,with the sample packs of a modest FruityLoops project. The result isfamiliar yet otherworldly, drawing from an abundance of distinctcultural expression: folkloric takamba from the Songhai, Hausa filmsoundtracks from Northern Nigeria, Hip Hop from Bamako andRagga from Niamey.

Sweet and joyful sounds from the first half of 1960’s Tanzania. Salum Abdallah AND Cuban Marimba Band were at the forefront of “muziki wa dansi”, the emerging dance music scene influenced by Cuban 78s, dance music crazes like the twist and cha cha cha, and the local sounds of their home country. Hailing from the smaller town of Morogoro, they rose to be stars across the country. Out of over 100 sides recorded for local labels, mostly Mzuri Records of Kenya, these twelve songs are the cream of the crop. Only a few of these have ever been re-released in any form, and that hasn’t happened for several years. Lots of toe tappers, smile enhancers, and downright dancers, with a few slower and simpler songs to round it out. Taken from 1961-65, these twelve songs shine a brighter light on an already bright light that was Salum Abdallah, taken away from this earth all too early at the age of 37.

Kadi Yombo, published in 1989, is the most successful album in the quest for a fusion between tradition and modernity in Bwiti harp music of the Tsogho people of Gabon. Combining beating rattles with a layer of synthesizers, Papé Nziengui blends in a contrapuntal dialogue characteristic of harp playing: male song in appeal and female choir in response, male voice of the musical arc and rhythms of female worship. But above all it's Tsogho ritual music and modern studio orchestration. The result is an initiatory itinerary of 10 musical pieces which are all milestones likely to be simultaneously listened to, danced, meditated on, and soon acclaimed. In the years since, Nziengui has traveled he world from Lagos to Paris, from Tokyo to Cordoba, from Brussels to Mexico City to become a true icon, the emblem of Gabonese music. Like Bob Dylan, "electrifying" folk and Bob Marley mixing rock with reggae, some purists have criticized Nziengui for having distorted the music of harp by imposing a cross with modern instruments. They even went so far as to claim that Nziengui was just an average harpist covering his shortcomings with stunts that were only good for impressing neophytes; like playing a harp placed upside down behind his back or playing two or three harps simultaneously. Sincere convictions or venomous defamations, in any case, Nziengui never gave in to such attacks, imposing himself on the contrary to pay homage to the elders (Yves Mouenga, Jean Honoré Miabé, Vickoss Ekondo) while instructing the maximum of young people. He is thus the promoter of many young talents, the most prominent of which is certainly his nephew Jean Pierre Mingongué. In a conservative society where the sacred is confused with secrecy, exposing the mysteries of Bwiti in broad daylight can be punished by exclusion or even execution. Papé Nziengui has always claimed that he faces such risks because he never felt enslaved to a community that governs his life, that regulates his conduct, that has a right of censorship over his activities. Like Ravi Shankar, the famous sitarist, Papé Nziengui is a man of rupture but also of openness, a transmitter of culture. As proof, he has established himself in Libreville, Gabo's capital, as the main harpist for sessions and concerts, accompanying the greatest national artists (Akendengué, Rompavè, Annie-Flore Batchiellilys, Les Champs sur la Lowé, etc.) as well as foreign artists (Papa Wemba, Manu Dibango, Kassav', Toups Bebey, etc.). In 1988, he was the first harpist to release an album in the form of a cassette produced by the French Cultural Center (Papé Nziengui, Chants et Musiques Tsogho). At the same time, he created his own group (Bovenga), combining traditional music instruments (musical bow, drums, various percussion instruments, etc.) in the framework of a true national orchestra, which gave the first concert and the first tours of a traditional music that was both modern and dynamic, thus "democratizing" the harp, to the dismay of certain purists. On the other hand, in modern music, dominated by the logic of profit or even commercialism, artistic creation must often be adjusted for a specific audience based on reason rather than heart. But instead of allowing himself to be distorted, Papé Nziengui has always tried to produce music that is not a caricature, worthy in its expression as in its content, of the sacredness and transcendence of the music of the Origins. This is what makes Nziengui-not only the musician, but the man-someone whose age hasn't altered any of his freshness or authenticity.

Awesome Tapes From Africa the label began over 10 years ago with the reissue of Nahawa Doumbia's Vol. 3. The recordingkicked off a successful run of classic a...