Rolling Global Outernational Non-West Non-English (Some Exceptions) 2024 Thread (Often African guitar led bands)

This thread is mainly for polyrhythmic, international sounds that aren't big enough to get threads of their own (and often include use of old-school non-programmed instrumentation like guitars). I lean toward south of the equator sounds here that are sometimes less club-oriented than those of artists highlighted on Afrobeats, dancehall, soca, etc. threads. Sometimes, but not always, the artists are older than those on those other threads. More old-school bands too. Often less digital programming but if it includes such playing/programming it is usually less popular.

Here's last year's 2023 link

Rolling Global Outernational Non-West Non-English (Some Exceptions) 2023 Thread (Often African bands)

Chuck Eddy from his latest long essay about his fave 2023 albums:

Beyond that, I’m not sure how much more I can generalize, except to say that what I’m hearing out of Africa lately sounds a decade or more ahead of what I’m hearing from just about everywhere else. Who knows, maybe it always was. My favorite places on the Internet to find out about new music these days, for whatever it’s worth, are Pan African Music and the Brussels-based Rebel Up Nightshop; favorite record labels right now are Kampala’s Nyege Nyege Tapes (and its subsidiary Hakuna Kulala), Lisbon’s Príncipe (“most closely associated with a bouncy, staggered and sometimes roly-poly club sound—a syncretic blend of Angolan and Afro-Portuguese styles known as batida,” Resident Advisor puts it), and Geneva’s Les Disques Bongo Joe (“explores contemporary undergrounds to dig out extraordinary sounds and plows the furrows of time to unearth rare nuggets from here, there and everywhere” — bandcamp.) Not sure I could map out how exactly they interrelate, but it sure sounds like they do.

📸 Look at this post on Facebook https://accidentalevolution.wordpress.com/2024/01/05/150-best-albums-of-2023/?fbclid=IwAR1LMo6b1QDDtJO1ncngClxTsiqpAcsRff6jpqI86uBPRJkCafCesPKqEu4_aem_AdB7qnx7SXFUg4uYw719qcJ1kh-EypwcPWclI3bbz3EvqXbxJCdnkA-4LMyKDUU9H0w

https://www.allmusic.com/year-in-review/2023/favorite-latin-and-global

Allmusic,com list of fave Latin and Global is more pop than Xchuck Eddy

Bassekou Kouyate and his family band are doing a short US tour in February. Worth seeing these Malian greats if they’re near you.

New Les Amazones D'Afrique is great and has a fantastic video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Ob0ic-wyfo

That is great. Nice mix of sung and rapped vocals and fun closeups and moves in the video

https://www.bostonglobe.com/2024/01/10/arts/blacklisted-west-bank-basel-zayed-has-settled-into-his-new-musical-home-boston/

Oud player ( & psychotherapist) Basel Zayed some years back angered both Israel and the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank , so he moved to the U.S.

https://lincolncenter.org/series/lincoln-center-presents/globalfest-387

Assiko Golden Band De Grand Yoff: Magg Tekki

Bounaly: Dimanche à Bamako

Azuka Moweta and His Anioma Brothers Band of Africa: Nwanne Bu Ife

Saw someone named Sidney Terano’s substack and his list of 2023 albums liked included the above 3. I only know Bounaly whom I like

I saw Senegalese kora player and singer Ablaye Cissoko duet last night with French accordionist Cyrille Brotto in Washington DC last night. Cissoko’s voice, singing in Wolof I think, was so moving as was his harp like kora sounds . They spoke in French between songs. Someone who spoke French and English came on stage before 1 song and translated into English the Cissoko explanation of a song that was about the current numbers of Africans fleeing the continent on boats to go to Europe and many not surviving ( and others losing interest in these sad experiences as they happen again and again).

Cissoko and Brotto played NY at Carnegie Hall a few nights before

They are in Los Angeles tonight.

They're still touring behind their 2022 album https://ablayecissoko.bandcamp.com/album/instant

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ks5hx_U-ilU

Cissoko and Brotto video

RIP DJ Katapila from Ghana. He blended Ghana styles with Chicago & Detroit style dance. He dj’d parties, funerals and more at home, and after Brian of Awesome Tapes from Africa found 2 of his tapes and re-released them, he did Europe gigs as well.

There’s a long heartfelt Awesome Tapes from Africa Instagram post

https://www.instagram.com/p/C2iRl0mo2ud/?igsh=aWQwamF1dWNuemNz

That is very sad. I saw him play alongside Ata Kak in Bristol and it was so much fun

Sorry to jump straight in here and derail slightly, but some of you might be interested in this thread Rolling DESI and SOUTH ASIAN music thread 2024 - Bhangra, Bollywood, Chutney Soca, Baila etc...

dunno if if north African crate-tape-digging fits here but listened to A Moi La Liberte: Early Electronic Rai a lot over Christmas and enjoyed it as much as anything I heard last year.

Yes it fits. Am leaving current programmed beat afrobeats/ afropop to the afropop thread, but almost anything else can go here.

DJ Katapila has died, per Awesome Tapes from Africa:

https://www.instagram.com/p/C2iRl0mo2ud/?img_index=1

https://djkatapila.bandcamp.com/

Brian from Awesome Tapes said DJ Katapila was one of his biggest supporters. I need to try to keep up better on the various Awesome Tapes reissues and such.

Busy listening to Pakistani vocalist Ali Sethi who did an album where he improvised ghazals over the electronic sounds of Nicolas Jaar. His more pop effort, a collaborative single with fellow Pakistani singer Shae Gill “Pasoori,” a Punjabi word that translates roughly to “difficult mess, went viral on Youtube in 2022 with hundreds of millions of viewers

The Ali Sethi 2023 album with Nicolas Jaar music is called Intiha

More 2023 music I am catching up on DJ FINALE - Pitschu Debou (feat. DeBoul & Le Meilleur)

Kinshasa’s DJ Finale ( a key member of Fulu Mziki) smelts soukous, trap and Afrobeats with flexibly jazzy electronics

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k8HgFBDsAyo

That's on the Nyege Nyege label

RIP Gustave Bentho Titiou dit Junior bassist and composier of Tout Puissant Poly Rythmo , at 73 . Am awesome old school band from Benin

Saw the news on Facebook and Twitter

New Mdou Moctar out on Matador I think in a day or 2

They're announcing the new Moctar album tomorrow; actual release date is in May. There will be a tour in June.

April 14 - Indio, CA @ Coachella Music and Arts Festival
April 21 - Indio, CA @ Coachella Music and Arts Festival
June 5 - Atlantic City, NJ @ Anchor Rock Club
June 6 - Harrisburg, PA @ The Abbey Bar at ABC
June 7 - Richmond, VA @ Cheers Brown’s Island
June 8 - Saxapahaw, NC @ Haw River Ballroom
June 9 - Asheville, NC @ The Orange Peel
June 11 - Charleston, SC @ Pour House
June 12 - Birmingham, AL @ Saturn
June 13 - Atlanta, GA @ Terminal West
June 14 - Manchester, TN @ Bonnaroo
June 15 - Indianapolis, IN @ The Hi-Fi
June 18 - Chicago, IL @ Thalia Hall
June 19 - Detroit, MI @ Magic Bag
June 20 - Cleveland, OH @ Beachland Ballroom
June 21 - Buffalo, NY @ Asbury Hall
June 22 - Greenfield, MA @ Green River Music Festival
June 23 - Boston, MA @ Paradise Rock Club
June 26 - Brooklyn, NY @ Warsaw
June 27 - Washington, DC @ 9:30 Club
June 28 - Philadelphia, PA @ Union Transfer

Ah yes. Moctar Funeral for Justice album title track here

https://www.stereogum.com/2253502/mdou-moctar-funeral-for-justice/music/

But Stereogum writer and editor doesn’t know the difference between Nigeria and Niger. Someone has mentioned it in the comments but they haven’t corrected it yet as of Wednesday morning ET

Ethiopian band Qwanqwa are returning to US for another tour. Their violinist is not Ethiopian but speaks Amharic and lives or lived there

They had an earlier IG post on how relieved they were to finally get visas approved for this tour, although the process was expensive, involved multiple languages, Gregorian and Ethiopian Ge’ez calendars, translation work, lawyers, and clunky government websites

Listening to Egyptian singer Mohamed Hamaki now . He's doing a short US tour. In suburban Washington DC Saturday

North American tour I mean. He did a Toronto show

Awesome Tapes From Africa and Sahel Sounds are offering digital albums for "Name Your Price" on Bandcamp Friday (today!):
https://awesometapesfromafrica.bandcamp.com/
https://sahelsounds.bandcamp.com/

Did you get anything? I got busy and well, maybe next time

Kaethe Hostetter, American violinist from Ethiopian group Qwanqwa , who lived in Addis for 11 years, but is now based in Brooklyn has been doing some solo violin and electronics gigs playing music influenced by her time in Ethiopia. Alas, I missed her Baltimore gig. Saw a video clip on Facebook that looked good. Qwanqwa are starting a north American tour March 31

Music from Saharan WhatsApp 04
by Alkibar Junior

"We've made this release available again as the band was recently a victim of radical extremists who destroyed all of their musical equipment. The band is currently raising funds to bring music back to Niafounke, and all proceeds to to the band"

https://alkibar.bandcamp.com/album/music-from-saharan-whatsapp-04

more info here:
https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-alkibar-junior-bring-music-back-to-mali

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bk4mn4CKVXA

curmudgeon asked: "Did you get anything?"

I got these, all are wonderful:
https://awapoulo.bandcamp.com/album/poulo-warali
https://hailumergia.bandcamp.com/album/pioneer-works-swing-live
https://lesfillesdeillighadad.bandcamp.com/album/les-filles-de-illighadad
https://lesfillesdeillighadad.bandcamp.com/album/at-pioneer-works

I was already familiar with the Awa Poulo and first Les Filles albums and threw down some cash to keep myself honest.
Love love love Hailu Mergia and will buy anything he puts out.

Nice haul

Sahel Sounds Go Fund Me fundraiser to get instruments for for Alkibar Jr , still going

So this old-school promoter who doesn’t plan well in advance or research well is booking the Bassekou Kouyate tour ( that is skipping DC because she insists band wants a guarantee in advance and no venue will do that) and she’s booking the Mokoomba tour . For Mokoomba I have now given her a list of clubs and contact information. Hopefully she will be successful

She means well.

https://amp.theguardian.com/music/2024/mar/13/el-wali-the-shapeshifting-voice-of-saharan-struggle?fbclid=PAAaY3Ka6zGNehxSS4q6_8tb39tkjrPsJ028zRSuHhuCpq5roj4E2aEz6jY8c_aem_AUK1BEloS0B1zNJD_lchzx8mhISkqEq1-LvBLpqR-I355qNIiKXgqyXGE3W5W5VLi5Q

El Wali from Saharan Sahel

Florence Adooni debut album is on its way on Philophon, new single is wonderful:

https://florenceadooni.bandcamp.com/album/uh-ah-song

...and this is a different song from a festival appearance last year:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ypv0_LM4c60

pure heat

https://www.jazzisdead.com/news/ebo-taylor-amp-pat-thomas-tour-postponed

Visa issues seem to have caused postponement until next year of Ebo Taylor and Pat Thomas Ghanaian music legends tour

Nice Guardian article on the talented oudist Huda Asfour , a Palestinian who lived in Egypt for awhile, later in the Washington DC area where I saw her perform and met her, and now she’s in the NYC region

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/oct/09/huda-asfour-palestinian-music

https://www.objectsandsounds.com/product/dun-dun-band-pita-parka-pt-i-xam-egdub/

Dun-Dun band is influenced by some African sounds

https://www.hearingthings.co/lollises-afrofuturistic-pop-utopia/

Lollise is a Botswana raised singer now in NY and her afropop could maybe be on the Afropop thread but it also works here . Her producer Morgan Greenstreet is also a drummer with NY based Congolese band Loboko, and a DJ

NY-based Congolese band Loboko have one single out (also on Bandcamp) and there are a few videos of them on Youtube

Turns out that legendary band Karantamba from The Gambia had another album out in the 80s next to Ndigal (which is a must-hear)
https://terangabeat.bandcamp.com/album/galgi

I'm playing it right now and it's the right kind of hypnotic grooves, part desert, part coast.

"When I visited Bai Janha in August 2010 in his house in Kololi to prepare the release of Ndigal, he told me that he had another unreleased album on two master reel tapes. The next days we were trying to find in Gambia a reel to reel machine to listen to them. We finally found one, but it was not in a good shape, so the sound was coming out poorly, it struck me though the ‘80s sound of the synthesizers and guitars and I hoped I would have another chance to listen to them properly."

That Karantamba does sound good

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ieGX33GsNHg

Songhoy Blues doc

https://www.npr.org/2024/10/10/nx-s1-5147220/lebanon-israel-hezbollah-music-middle-east-war

Fairuz and other Lebanon musicians now

thank you

I saw NY-based Congolese band Loboko last night in DC. Energetic show of danceable Congolese guitar-led rumba before a small crowd. They just have a single out (on their bandcamp) plus some video footage on Youtube

x-post-- You're welcome. That Lebanon musicians at a time of war article is informative and emotional

yes i didnt know what else to say really, any other words seemed so banal given the awful context :/

So Loboko kinda reminds me of 80s and 90s soukous, but the band members insist that they're as modern and contemporary as Fally Ipupa , who is a bigger star and plays larger room. I need to listen more and research how Congolese music has changed over the years.

Fally Ipupa North American tour got cancelled at last minute

Need to get some albums here considered for 2024 critics polls

I am forever bored with end of year lists that just have rock and rap and pop on them, but I haven't had time to really dig for other stuff myself that much this year.

Saw Apache Indian and Panjabi MC on a double bill at the weekend in London and it was so so much fun. Audience was around 70% South Asian heritage, many in the 40-60 age bracket and you could tell this was a big night out and a special occasion for a lot of people. And it was! Just so much energy from beginning to end. It felt like a proper party.

I was fairly young when "Boom-Shaka-Lak" came out, but the more I read about Apache Indian the more I realise he was streets ahead in fusing the (hugely popular) ragga/dancehall/reggae-pop style with the (hugely unappreciated outside of Indian-heritage enclaves and the odd novelty appearance on light entertainment shows) Bhangra style. You look at where he recorded and who he recorded with and it shows he was always much more than a one-hit wonder

Here are a few things I've been enjoying that may or may not be relevant to the thread. We kind of need a revival of the outernational dance threads I guess

MOMO. - P​á​ra (feat. Jessica Lauren)
This wonderful slice of moody, relaxing Brazilian jazzy grooviness
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=unC7q5S6Gn4

Sliime x Gagan Kooner - Punjabi Queen
UK Punjabi rap
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pcmk8j_oBtY

Jaubi - Chandrakauns
Pakistani jazz troupe exploring fusion and Northern Indian classical music who had an album out this year
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QsvBJ914reg

Tshegue - Shuffle
Congolese-French collab band return with this slammer. Whole EP is very good indeed
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=amgdlvPSAP8

Kalash - So Coman
French-Martinique rapper Kalash is such a force and this is one of the best things I've heard from him so far
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=14GClBV33jQ

Freebot x Rosa Pistola - Regarega
Mexican hard-psy? Strap in!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N7iQRISCdvo

wow, love the MOMO song. thank you for sharing these, great variety.

Heard that Tshegue track a month or two back on a recommendation from Kevin Martin (The Bug). Great stuff but the other tracks I heard weren't so blown-out, which was disappointing. I'm always up for noisy African stuff like that or Phelimuncasi.

Xp Yeah thats a great song

Xp unperson have you heard Muanapoto by them? Really like it

I saw a nice traditional Malian music gig last night by singer/guitarist Habib Koite and his band. The group included a balafon player, a kora player, and a percussionist with djembe drums and one of those globe shaped drums. This was the last show of their month long tour of the US.

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2024/nov/21/malian-singer-rokia-traore-to-be-extradited-from-italy-to-belgium

This is a sad mess. Singer Rokia Traoré facing charges due to a custody battle

oh wow, that's awful, i hadn't heard any of it

Mdou Moctar making some best of lists

https://www.albumoftheyear.org/album/891302-mohammad-syfkhan-i-am-kurdish.php

Syfkhan I am Kurdish album on quietus albums of year list . I haven’t heard it yet

Sorry to spam/blow me own trumpet, but some of you might be interested in my latest "Bangers Without Borders" mix that ties in with the Terrain community / club night I run: https://soundcloud.com/charliestoicdj/2024-bangers-without-borders-pt-1

listened to it last week, it was a lot of fun! need to go back to it with the tracklist in front of me so i can figure out whats what

xxp mohammad syfkhan in a tiny pub in brighton was one of the greatest things i saw this year...

https://www.instagram.com/reel/C4nEoV1A5yE/?igsh=MWF4M2t3YW1hNGYwNQ==

Thanks for listening NickB! :-)

Palestinian oudist and singer Huda Asfour is back in Egypt where she has family and lived for awhile. I met her when she was in DC getting an engineering degree and a masters and performing sometimes at night. I don’t think she has anything new out , but her occasional IG stories and posts of gigs are worth checking out. She also lived in NYC for a bit. She has some music on streaming and I think on YouTube and Bandcamp

Jon Pareles additional 15 standout albums after his top 10 includes Arooj Aftab, “Night Reign”; Les Amazones d’Afrique, “Musow Danse (Bonus Edition)

An Arabic music dj in DC tonight is billing his session tonight as "Free Syria." He's excited about the rebellion gaining ground there

Just noticed that Syrian electro-dabke singer Omar Souleyman who fled Syria around the time of the 2011 rebellion and ended up in Turkey for awhile has recently been living in Erbil, Iraq and his earlier 2024 album is called Erbil. I haven't listened to it yet, but I see Pitchfork wasn't crazy about it. I saw him in DC once at the 930 Club. He's doing some European shows this month

https://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/omar-souleyman-erbil/

Mdou Moctar is doing a solo acoustic tour of US in February

Mdou Moctar acoustic seems like an artist fundamentally misunderstanding their own appeal, but OK.

I think he’s just trying to vary things a bit , as he and the band have toured a lot. Oh, his tour includes Canada dates as well.

Let an artist do what he wants ( if this is done because he feels like varying things musically). I have seen him at least 5 times with a band over the years .

Seeing Senegalese guitarist Tidiane Thiam on some best of lists .

This man is on Sahel Sounds

this could also go in jazz or modern brazil: Fabiano do Nascimento and Shin Sasakubo on guitars, gorgeous stuff

https://fabianodonascimentoandshinsasakubo.bandcamp.com/album/harm-nicos

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c2exzm9r043o

RIP Zakir

Zakir Hussain, one of the world's greatest tabla players, has died at the age of 73.

The Indian classical music icon died of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, a lung disease, at a hospital in San Francisco, his family said in a statement.

Hussain was a four-time Grammy award winner and has received the Padma Vibhushan, India's second-highest civilian award.

Through his performances, he transformed the tabla into a globally loved solo instrument that was the star of the show.

The tabla - a pair of drums used in Indian classical music - was historically viewed as an accompaniment to the main performance.

Former ilxor Keith Harris has this in his best-of list for Racket , his Minnesota site

19. Sisso & Maiko, Singeli Ya Maajabu

Sisso is among the better-known producers of singele, a Tanzanian dance music style supposedly derived from Zanzibar’s taarab (a style I know even less about) and so wildly sped up it should be measured in beats per second. Jamming live to Singele’s beats on keys is Maiko, who vamps with ostinatos, doodles wildly on top, and occasionally runs a finger along the keys till he reaches the highest note, just to be funny. I’m told singele is often tough-guy music, but the effect here is comic, even cartoonish. During the nearly six minutes of the frenetic, dayglo “Kazi Ipo,” I feel like a paper cone that’s been stuck into a cotton candy machine.

More from Keith -

2. Various artists, Kampire Presents: A Dancefloor in Ndola

A compilation of mostly decades-old Afropop? Isn’t that… cheating? Well I make the rules here, bub, and despite two familiar Congolese names (Samba Mapangala and Tshala Muana, their great ’90s records are streaming, check ’em out) all these tracks are new to me and—don’t front—you too. Yet to Kampire, a Ugandan DJ and part of the crew behind the Nyege Nyege festival and label (they put out the Sisso & Maiko album) these have nostalgic appeal, as they might to a queer party thrower in a country where gay sex is a capital crime. Sureshot opener Princess Aya Shara’s “O Wina Tienge” sets the tone with soukous guitars from Zaire trading elegance for the frisky, chattering melodies that appealed to Kenyan audiences, though the comp also dips into South African for added sass (the Township bubblegum of V-Mash’s “Naughty Boy,” the early kwaito of Di Groovy Girls). Artifacts of a simpler time? Not if you know your history. More like reminders that the beat goes on, in good times and bad.

On Keith's runner up list --Les Amazones d’Afrique, Musow Danse;

This is all over the internet at the moment. An African Country Gospel song, by (I think) SDA Youth Songs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sh2v_CYMayo

or maybe those are the publishers. The artist is MAOMBI SAMSON

Seems like a TikTok viral thing too.

Less viral things I have been enjoying watching are Sahel Sounds on Instagram sharing Instagram stories and posts from a rural Fulani area of Senegal by an ethnomusicologist I think who has an IG page called blind.in.1.eye

https://www.instagram.com/reel/DDfy3lnIYbg/?igsh=MTY0MDRnNTlkZHo3YQ==