African Tuesday: MoreTabu Ley!
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See previous post. This time, you actually get to hear a Tabu Ley vocal. M'bilia Bel is one this one, too....
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Comments (11)
That intro has a nice George Harrison mid eighties vibe & feel. (sorry for that point of reference but its true...I thought of Geoge immediately). There's a very skillful string bender in there, delightful.
That's a pretty point of reference. Africans often have this terrific, shimmery guitar sound that, unintentionally, is quite Harrison-esque...
"......Africans often have this terrific, shimmery guitar sound that, unintentionally, is quite Harrison-esque..."
my hat's off to you man.
Lively and mellifluous, the way I like it...
As a little extra treat, here is "Boya Ye", written by Tabu Ley, sung by M'Bilia Bel, with backing by Tabu Ley's 1980s backing band Orchestra Afrisa. this came out over here in 1986 on an LP called "African Moves". The soukous style of music played here derives its name from the French secouer - to shake
The way I like it, too, Signore Stiletto....
Baudolino, this is choice. The soukous debt to Latin music is quite in evidence. By the way, Afrisa was the band behind him at the concert I attended. They could have worked for James Brown anyday....
made me think of paul simon's graceland
haha WONDER why?
A little farther north, but the same basic idea....
They could have worked for James brown...but would James have understood it? Producer Paul Wexler had the interesting idea in the early 80s of putting James together with Sly and Robbie at Compass Point. Without belittling his giant status, it did expose the narrowness of his musical perception.
This is definitely creme de la creme. Congolese pop music I've heard before was a type that sounded more Cuban, but this could fool me as it resembles one of your Kenyan offerings, and it also sounds a little South African, because it has that steady downbeat from the drum. At any rate, it's great!
Jonh, I'd posted a response before, but Shloopy seems to be back, and hungry. The comment boiled down to this: Not sure that JB and Afrisa would have been a winning proposition in the studio, but live they would have two steps ahead of him.
Spike, I think you're exactly right about the provenance of this, especially the East African part of this. The Latin elements are still there, but more discreetly so. I suspect that, by this time, Tabu Ley was not only searching for a little variety but also nurturing pan-African ambitions - after all, he was a star across the entire continent.