Spinner

Toubab Krewe Are Rolling From Bonnaroo to Bamako With 'TK2'

Steve Hochman — 2010-09-07T14:30:00 00:00

A little irony music, please.

Drew Heller, guitarist for the North Carolina-based Afro-jam band Toubab Krewe, is standing in a Nashville parking lot talking on his cell phone about the band's musical journey. It's a trip that's gone from childhood friendship to West Africa adventures, the latter providing the signature sounds that have made the group's undulating mix of kora, electric guitar, bass and percussion a favorite of the Bonnaroo crowd. This is a trek these five friends have taken together starting when Heller and kora player Justin Perkins started playing music together in school as 10-year-olds in the fifth grade.

And then the band's tour bus starts to roll without him.

Well, that little if perfectly timed misstep aside, the journey - which has taken them to Africa four times -- can be traced in an arc that plays out on the instrumental band's new album, "TK2," its first studio set in five years. (Hear the entire album here at Spinner's Listening Party this week.) As they prepare to head to Africa for a fifth time in early 2011 to reconnect with mentor Lamine Soumano and help build his music school, as well as soak in the sounds via jams with various locals, they've taken the opportunity on the new album to recapitulate the music that's brought them to this point.

King Sunny Ade Goes to Some Lengths for New Album's Fuller Sounds

Steve Hochman — 2010-08-31T14:30:00 00:00

Filed under: Around the World

A ritual of King Sunny Ade's fans outside of Africa dating back to the release of 'Juju Music,' his 1982 international debut for Island Records, may be in peril with his new album. 'Baba Mo Tunde,' coming Sept. 28. As 'Juju Music' became a phenomenon, the leading edge of what would grow into a substantial interest in African music, word got out that the recordings heard there were just abbreviated renditions of longer - much longer - releases in Nigeria. Soon import shops were being combed for the originals and their LP-side-long tracks - which themselves were merely condensed versions of what was soon heard in concerts as Ade and his African Beats band made their first US tour. And that was merely a taste of what they did at home, with all-night concerts for weddings and other celebrations being the norm.

But check this out: The new album's title song alone runs more than 31 minutes! And the shortest of the seven pieces that total close to two hours of music still pushes nine minutes. Heck, even a King Britt remix of the title track runs longer than 15 minutes.

Rajasthan's Dhoad Gypsies Dig Roots From Surprising Cultures

Steve Hochman — 2010-08-24T14:30:00 00:00

Filed under: Around the World

It was an odd sight: a man in a bright orange brocaded robe walking down the streets between the fjord-side hills of Forde, Norway, blowing out great puffs of fire from his mouth.

That was as incongruous as, oh, the notion of Rajasthani reggae.

Er ...

Dhoad Gypsies of Rajasthan, 'Rajasthani Reggae'

Yes, the same people are behind both of these. At the Forde Festival, the Dhoad Gypsies of Rajasthan showed themselves as willing to do just about anything to entertain: the fire-breathing fakir, the acrobatic dancer who did backbends to pick up rings off the floor with her eyelids and, of course, a vibrant range of music rooted in the traditions of the troupe's home in the colorful Indian region.

Khaira Arby's Mission From God Moves From Mali to America

Steve Hochman — 2010-08-17T13:30:00 00:00

Filed under: Around the World

Not only is Malian singer Khaira Arby finally giving her first concerts in North America after more than 20 years as a professional singer at home but also she's premiering an unreleased song of praise for the land she's visiting.

"I think America is the center of the world and I want to sing to other people to follow the example of America, a great example of solidarity and helpfulness," she says, speaking in French from her Timbuktu home via translator Marie Louise.

It's quite a contrasting view to that we have here of late, of a politically and culturally polarized multiverse of cable TV shouting heads and blogged flame wars.

But Arby, in her concerts here, is singing her brand-new song 'Yesterday's America, Today's America, Tomorrow's America' in honor of what to her is a shining beacon of unity and possibility.

'Forgotten' Music Leads Frank Fairfield to Newfound Far-Flung Friendship

Steve Hochman — 2010-08-10T13:30:00 00:00

Filed under: Around the World

Frank Fairfield was just looking for some information about an old, obscure recording. He wound up with a doppelganger. In Kenya. Well, sort of.

Fairfield is a Los Angeles-based musician and record collector. In both cases, his leanings tend to what he calls "pre-urban" music, playing banjo and fiddle on old-timey American tunes and collecting old 78 phonograph discs of items from all over the globe. It's the latter he focused on when Josh Rosenthal, proprietor of the archivist Tomkins Square label, asked him to put together a CD - 'Unheard Ofs & Forgotten Abouts' - drawn from said collection.

Once he made the selections, he set about gathering info for the liner notes. For some that was fairly straightforward - the 1916 recording of Scottish bagpipe tunes by Pipe-Major Forsyth and Drums that opens the album, the 1929 'Poor Convict Blues,' by Slim Barton and James Moore, the popular Appalachian fiddle effects showcase 'Fox Chase' in a little-known version by Charlie Bowman and Al Hopkins, an authentic pre-rock version of the Veracruzian folk song 'La Bamba,' by Hermanos Huesca, for example. Info was relatively easy to come by. But others posed a challenge to say anything specific about the artist, recording or even the label of origin. One of those was 'Pius Ogola,' a rather latter-day shellac 78 from the '60s featuring the eight-stringed lyre called the nyatiti, played by Akumu Odhiambo.

Natacha Atlas Illuminates the Shifting Global Zeitgeist

Steve Hochman — 2010-08-03T16:00:00 00:00

Filed under: Around the World

LOS ANGELES - As the sky over the Skirball Center transformed from twilight to night, Natacha Atlas and her band - performing in the cultural organization's hilltop courtyard alongside the 405 Freeway - shifted from music associated with Lebanese pop-folk idol Fairuz to English somber-jazz-folkie Nick Drake to American jazz-soul activist Nina Simone just as smoothly and imperceptibly. It was a neat trick, but it hardly covered the full range of the evening.

Atlas, an Anglo-Egyptian raised in Belgium and England, and launched to renown through the world-fusion electronica of Transglobal Underground before starting her own wide-ranging solo career, juggled French, Arabic and English in the lyrics while the six-member band went even further. And yet never was there a sense of disjointedness, culture-hopping or even juxtaposition. At one point, pianist Alcyona Mick used Aly El Minyawi's percolating Arabic rhythms as a launching pad for a churning salsa solo straight out of Eddie Palmieri, with violinist/musical director Samy Bishai and cellist Peggy Baldwin (the latter a one-day hire but sounding as if she'd played with the ensemble for years) joining in to evoke swaying palm trees with their sinuous lines. Cairo? Havana? Take your pick. The dozens of people who got up to sway themselves would be happy with either.

Gamalost and Goat Horn: Travels With Norway's World-Jazzer Karl Seglem

Steve Hochman — 2010-07-27T16:30:00 00:00

Filed under: Around the World

SOGNEFJORD, NORWAY - Carl takes us to the Tine Dairy in the town of Vik, the only dairy that produces gamalost cheese, an acquired taste indeed with its almost grain-like texture and somewhat bitter taste, but it's one that is acquired instantly. It is tied to the Norse of more than a millennium ago, the very low-fat treat attributed with medicinal properties and even extolled as a booster of sexual prowess -- the Viking Viagra!

We're served a large platter of the stuff -- including some dipped in aquavit -- as well as an array of other local cheeses. That's Lunch No. 1. Then Carl (his son) takes us on a thrilling speedboat ride to Finnabotn, an isolated old farmhouse turned inn for a gourmet Lunch No. 2 of smoked wild salmon (put in the smoker the day before, just eight hours after it was caught nearby), prepared by Chef Alexander and served following a little tour around the grounds where he picks the native herbs for his concoctions.

Najma Akhtar and Gary Lucas Bring 'Rishte' Alive in London

Steve Hochman — 2010-07-20T14:00:00 00:00

Filed under: Around the World

LONDON - The Hindi word rishte, explained singer Najma Akhtar onstage at the Jazz Cafe in Camden Town last Thursday, means relationship or connection - with a lover, God, time or even a creative process. It was by this point already quite clear this evening that the latter was very much the case with Gary Lucas, with whom she was sharing the stage and a very creative connection in only their second concert together since she and the New York-based guitarist first collaborated on the arresting Indian-blues hybrids of the 2009 album titled, yes, 'Rishte.' From the very first notes of the night, they not only matched the magic of the recordings, featured in an Around the World installment last year, but revealed new aspects to the teaming and great promise for further explorations.

With the intimate club hosting a mix of the artists' fans, family and friends, the pair were engagingly loose and playful, giving the album's material a distinct new edge and immediacy even beyond the one previous performance in November at the WOMAD Festival's extravaganza in the Canary Islands' Las Palmas (captured in several videos, including the one of the album's title song embedded with this story). Lucas, sporting an impish grin under his pleasantly rumpled wide-brimmed hat, set the tone, London-based Akhtar readily going with that in-the-moment spirit - there wasn't much choice, apparently, as she noted that they'd had just one rehearsal for this appearance. So there's that rishte with time, a theme running through the mostly Hindi and Urdu lyrics.

Freedom in Førde: A Globe's Worth of Music Accentuates World-Class Festival

Steve Hochman — 2010-07-13T14:00:00 00:00

Filed under: Around the World

The Førde Folk Music Festival was officially opened with welcomes to a crowd of 1,800 in the Førdehuset auditorium in 10 languages - from the two head directors of the event and eight participating artists coming to Norway from Asia, Africa, and North and South America, as well as Europe. It was perhaps odd, then, that Her Majesty Queen Sonja made her dedication remarks in English.

Odd, not because she's the queen of, you know, Norway. And most in the audience were her Norwegian subjects. It was because in the course of the weekend event, English may well have been the least important language in the international array of artists and fans. It was barely there in the opening night concert featuring short sets by eight of the acts from the weekend's lineup, or in the musical parade of nations through the town's center on Saturday morning (led by Serbia's brass band kings the Boban i Marko Markovic Orkestar and brought up by the Dhoad Gypsies of Rajasthan, complete with a fire-eater spouting fountains of flame) or the closing roundup with another sampler-plate offering from other acts who had played. And that's not to mention in the dozens of full shows held at 30 sites in and around the lovely town of of Førde , nestled in the hills at the eastern end of the Førdefjorden fjord in western Norway. (Tip to other promoters: The opening/closing sampler concerts and a parade of artists should be pretty much no-brainer elements for any kind of festival, so get with it.)

Pining for the Fjords: Førde Festival Bringing the World to Norway

Steve Hochman — 2010-07-06T14:00:00 00:00

As the World Cup winds up its run this weekend - pick one - a) transcending or b) putting a sharper focus on the tensions and divisions of global geopolitics, more than 25,000 people will be gathering in a small town tucked along a fjord in western Norway to do both. And without all those fake injury dramatics.

Every July since 1990, the town of Førde has hosted a wide variety of musical acts from all over the globe in its Førde Festival, with lineups that have come to rival those of the top such events in other, larger and more known locales. And each year, the conclave has taken on a theme, this time being Freedom and Oppression, as played out in the presence of such relevant acts as the Kurdish Iranian family ensemble the Kamkars, Roma-rooted Balkan brass titans Boban i Marko Markovic and an England-based group of exiled Uyghur musicians from the steppes of China among them.

"This year, with 'Freedom and Oppression' as the theme, we focus on cultures where musicians - and often people in general - have been oppressed, like the Samis in the Nordic countries, the Gypsies in Eastern Europe, the Garifuna people in Honduras, the Palestinian people in the Middle East, the Uyghur people from China, the Jews in many countries and the Kurdish people," says Hilde Bjørkum, managing and artistic director of the festival. "Also Malouma, from Mauritania, who has met problems because of the content of her songs, singing about AIDS and women's rights, for example."

Niger Nomad Ensemble Etran Finatawa's Prodigal Journey Home

Steve Hochman — 2010-06-29T14:00:00 00:00

Filed under: Around the World

Before taking Niger Saharan trance music back around the world on a current tour, the members of the band Etran Finatawa wanted to do another tour, taking its music and culture to a new audience: the children of Niger.

"It's a project that we have been planning for a couple of years," says band manager Sandra van Edig. "We have done many workshops abroad, school workshops in Europe and England and the US. There's always that question when you're traveling a lot and you want to bring something to help the people of your country as well."

The group, whose unique lineup includes members of both the Tuareg and Wodaabe clans, with music both hypnotic and involving, had seen other African artists channel resources from international success into building schools, drilling water wells and other development projects in their home countries. But while Etran Finatawa had traveled the globe, they did not have the funds to launch such efforts.

Source Outing With Oscar Winner A.R. Rahman: Bollywood and Far Beyond

Steve Hochman — 2010-06-22T14:00:00 00:00

Filed under: Around the World

"Not like this before."

That's A.R. Rahman's answer when asked if he'd ever done anything comparable to the current tour of elaborate dance numbers staged to highlights from his vast catalog of music composed for Indian films.

"It's a combination of Broadway and a rock concert and Bollywood," he says. "I've been wanting to do this for ages."

Well, when you've become the first Bollywood composer to win an Academy Award (he actually won two: one for Best Score and one for Best Song) as he did last year for 'Slumdog Millionaire' and the number 'Jai Ho' - the peak of a run of acclaim that also included two Golden Globes and two Grammy Awards - you can do a few things you've never done before.

Persian Music Iconoclast Mohsen Namjoo Rocks Through 'Strange Times'

Steve Hochman — 2010-06-15T14:00:00 00:00

When Iranian musician Mohsen Namjoo developed a distinctive approach that wove together ancient Persian poetry and sensibilities with influences of Western rock and blues in a singular, individualistic aesthetic, the reaction was clear:

"I got kicked out of university," he says.

When Iranian musician Mohsen Namjoo continued to develop a distinctive approach that wove together ancient Persian poetry and sensibilities with influences of Western rock and blues in a singular, individualistic aesthetic, the reaction was clear:

"I got a fellowship at university."

OK, the first time was in repressive Tehran in the '90s. The second at California's culturally liberal Stanford recently. But the two experiences together mirror the streams merging in his striking music. 'Strange Times,' a new song previewing an album-in-progress, neatly encapsulates his personal evolution. Its words come from Iranian poet Ahamad Shamloo (Namjoo's favorite, who passed away not long ago) but here in translation into English by the singer's filmmaker friend Babak Payami, who also served as translator for this interview. As he crafted a song entirely in English - a first for him, commissioned as part of a short film for the National Endowment for Democracy, he found himself wanting to give it a setting clearly Persian in reference.

Herbie Hancock, 'Space Captain,' Feat. Susan Tedeschi and Derek Trucks -- Video Premiere

Steve Hochman — 2010-06-14T15:30:00 00:00

Filed under: Video, Exclusive

Want a treat? When you watch the video for Herbie Hancock's new version of 'Space Captain' featuring singer Susan Tedeschi and her husband, Derek Trucks, on guitar, watch the video. Heck, put the sound on mute. Yeah, strange thing to ask for a music video that really is only in-studio footage of the musicians playing together, especially one with such supremely talented musicians as this.

But it's the looks on these musicians' faces as they play together that really tells the tale here. Pay special attention to the break halfway through the song, where Hancock trades licks with Trucks on slide guiatar and Kofi Burbridge working the Hammond B3 organ. The pianist peels off a lick, Trucks' eyes light up, Hancock shows surprised delight as Burbridge answers musically, and then everyone in the room seems in wonder as Trucks takes the lead in the instrumental conversation.

'Champeta Criolla' Compilation Rides Colombia's Wild Afrobeat Wave

Steve Hochman — 2010-06-08T14:00:00 00:00

Filed under: Around the World

Never mind the British Invasion. In the early '70s, Colombia was host to an Afrobeat Invasion. DJs were spinning whatever highlife, juju and soukous records they could get their hands on via their colorful picos sound systems in the poorer neighborhoods of Barranquilla and Cartegena and just as garage bands throughout North America in the previous decade were churning out enthusiastic - if rough - versions of "Day Tripper" and "Satisfaction," Colombian combos of varying quality were playing competing interpretations of Nigerian icon Fela Anakulapo Kuti's 'Shakara' and 'Zombie' by the handful.

"So Colombia is the first Afrobeat nation outside of Africa," asserts Lucas Silva, a Bogota-native DJ and record producer who only in recent years became aware of the phenomenon.

That awareness quickly became an obsession. The obsession became several years of digging in junk shops, music stores and private collections for "lost" recordings. And that endeavor became 'Palenque Palenque: Champeta Criolla & Afro Roots in Colombia 1975-91,' a new collection of 21 slices of this fascinating history from the English archival label Soundway Records.

Algerian-French Superstar Rachid Taha Tests His American Accent Saying 'Bonjour'

Steve Hochman — 2010-06-01T14:00:00 00:00

Filed under: Around the World

The last time we spoke with Algerian-French superstar Rachid Taha - two years ago when he was performing in Los Angeles - he was pining for Dolly Parton. Well, at least he wanted to sing with her. Still does, he confesses now, in a phone conversation from Paris, via translation by his manager Rikki Stein in London.

But he also has another infatuation with a pop icon he wants to discuss.

"Johnny Rotten!" he enthuses, adding that he'd go to great lengths to arrange a duet. "I'd even sleep with him!"

Well, unlike Parton, he has actually met Mr. Rotten, a.k.a. John Lydon. And the two have had some rewarding - if strictly platonic - time together.

The reference was not random. On his latest album, 'Bonjour,' Taha has reworked one of Lydon's tracks, the 1983 Public Image Ltd. classic 'This Is Not a Love Song.' In Taha's crafty hands, though, it's become 'It's An Arabian Song,' and taken on a message far beyond Lydon's pop/anti-pop screed.

Herbie Hancock 'Imagines' a New Global Vision With a Star-Studded Cast

Steve Hochman — 2010-05-25T14:30:00 00:00

Filed under: Around the World

He happened to be in Mumbai anyway, part of a US State Department trek with students of the Thelonious Monk Institute to mark the 50th anniversary of an India journey Dr. Martin Luther King took there to study Mahatma Gandhi's nonviolent approach to social action. He happened to be in the company of Chaka Khan, along with George Duke and Dee Dee Bridgewater. So he thought he'd take the opportunity to do a little recording session.

"Since I'm going to be in India, why not do this?" he recalls.

We all have stories that start like that, of course. But this one is Herbie Hancock's, and it's the tale of the kickoff of what became 'The Imagine Project,' an album of truly global proportions spanning five continents and involving artists from dozens of countries and cultures in, well, truly imaginative and arresting combinations.

Ensemble Fatien Revitalize the Connections Between Africa and New Orleans

Steve Hochman — 2010-05-19T12:30:00 00:00

Filed under: Around the World

"This city!" says Seguenon Koné of his adopted city, New Orleans. "Anybody who comes to visit is going to have to move to New Orleans. It's electric! The people!"

That's what happened to the Ivory Coast native, who after nearly a decade of living in New York and Orlando, Fla. (where he worked as a musician at Walt Disney World, of all places) started doing drum and dance workshops in New Orleans as the city started rebuilding following the 2005 flood, officially making it his home in 2008. And in that time he's become a central figure of what is becoming a surge of African musicians and music there. It's an interesting phenomenon. New Orleans music and culture, of course, is largely grown from African roots - though via Haiti, Cuba and other Caribbean capitals of 18th- and 19th-century slave trade.

From Sierra Leone to New Orleans: Refugee All Stars Feel at Home

Steve Hochman — 2010-05-11T14:00:00 00:00

Filed under: Around the World

NEW ORLEANS -- Refugee quickly became a loaded word in post-flood New Orleans. Sure, locals have long joked (some more jokingly than others) that the city is a Third World country. But refugee is really Third World: Africa, the Balkans, places torn by war and/or famine. Or so these displaced people insisted. For those scattered around the country after the US Army Corps of Engineers' flood walls failed after Hurricane Katrina touched in August 2005, being called that was just another insult, on top of the slow government response and such callous remarks as Barbara Bush's notorious quip that those being put up in the Houston Astrodome were somehow better off their than they had been in their now-washed-away homes. We're not refugees, rang the creed throughout the New Orleans diaspora. We are returnees.

And yet, Rueben Karoma, leader of the band proudly calling itself Sierra Leone's Refugee All Stars -- formed in the early 2000s at real refugee camps in Guinea, rough and at times perilous settings for the masses fleeing the brutal civil war in their West African homeland - sees a kinship with the people of New Orleans.

"We found ourselves in a bad situation," he explained backstage before the band's performance at the just-completed New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival. "We went through terrible times and were forced out of our homeland. Same with New Orleans."

The Chieftains, Ry Cooder and Friends Put the Irish-Mexican Connection on the Grill

Steve Hochman — 2010-04-20T14:00:00 00:00

Filed under: Around the World

Paddy Moloney came across some startling links between Irish and Mexican music while researching and recording the latest ambitious project from his band, the longtime leaders of the Irish traditional music revolution, the Chieftains. The album, a collaboration with Ry Cooder, features an array of guests along ith the California guitarist, including Linda Ronstadt, Lila Downs, Los Tigres del Norte, Irish singer Moya Brennan and various Mexican-rooted folk ensembles, including the San Francisco Bay Area collective Los Cenzontles. Oh, and a spoken part by Liam Neeson. With their help, Moloney explores a little-known piece of history: In the 1840s, some Irish immigrants fleeing the Potato Famine to the US and on arrival forced to fight in the raging Mexican-American war, broke away and took arms alongside the Mexican rebels.

But for Moloney, there's a cultural bridge made from sausage.

"So the next time you visit your grocer," he sings over the phone from Florida, where he has his North American home. "Tell him no other sausage will do."

It's a jingle for an Irish brand of encased meat products that he remembered, all too well it seemed, from many years ago on the radio. But more to the point, the tune he's singing is 'Jarabe Tapatío' -- commonly known as 'The Mexican Hat Dance.'

He continues the recital: "And if he insists, just say 'No sir!' It's Donnelly Sausage for you."