Sofrito Super Singles 003 
B Side
Money Make Man Mad (Sofrito Disco Dub)
Release Date: end of May 2010


Money make man mad (Sofrito disco dub)

BKO Quintet’s music is born from a meeting between five established artists.
This gathering provides a journey into the heart of the contemporary Mali. 

Ibrahima Sarr, powerful percussionist, masters with ease the sounds of the djembe drum and has traveled the world alongside Oumou Sangare.  Fassara Sacko whose voice takes you from aback, differs from other griots in traditional celebrations. Yoro Sidibé’s grandson, Nfali Diakité , with his infernal « tournes », also sings and plays his donsongoni in animist ceremonies celebrated by his peers.  Abdoulaye Kone, master of djelingoni develops a unique psychedelic style.  He is the descendant of Djeli Baba Sissoko, and has been solicited before this quintet by great artists like Tiken Jah Kafoly, Salif Keita to tour outside of the Mali borders.  Finally Aymeric Krol, experienced of internationals stages grooves on its strange drums. For the past 10 years he often settled in Bamako where he worked with several artists. Today, his encounter with Ibrahima Sarr gives birth to the project: BKO Quintet.

The first EP recorded « Live » in January 2012 in Bamako in the popular district of Medina Coura.  In the new edition, some tracks recorded in January 2013 have been added to the EP. The present arises from the past, this « inhabited » music is far from the « World » standardized sound.

After a European tour of 25 dates, BKO QUINTET decides to return in the studio during their tour to record a debut album that will be available in 2014.

03 Strange Wassolon

The word is out, the first move has been made, Piri Piri inprint is a fact. Debuting with the first release Piri Piri 001: A collection of four dance floor heaters in different African styles. 

Free Download

Sam Mapangala & Orchestre Virguna - Malako (Umoja Edit)

The Bas Lexter Ensample - Celias Baile (edit)

Henri Le Blanc gangs up on Xanga and brings the disco punch!

This Is The Way It Starts (Henri Le Blanc's Disco Gangs Session)

Teranga Beat’s aim since the beginning of the label is to release lost and unreleased recordings of both famous groups and formerly unknown artists of West Africa. While going through several archives of the region, what thrilled me the most was the feeling of unexpected, especially when I stumbled upon a terrific recording from a totally unknown group. Discovering music that nobody has ever listened to before. I guess it has something to do with the psychology of the collector, always searching for that record nobody has. 

My favourite discovery up to date is the Dieuf-Dieul de Thiès, a band that did not manage to release any of its recordings. I had previously heard their name in Thiès, but to my ears it sounded like an urban legend. People involved in music would rate it as the best group in the city, but nobody had ever seen a record from them, let alone a cassette. I thought it was one of these stories of gross exaggeration, so common in West Africa. However, when I fell upon their recordings and listened to them I realised it was all true.

In 2013 Teranga Beat released the first volume of Dieuf-Dieul's recordings. Today, on this vol. 2 album we proudly present the rest of their recorded tracks. On Vol.1 the tracks were well divided among three singers: Assane Camara with his unique style, an  Afro-Manding hybrid, which he acquired through years of performing in the South region of Senegal, but also by virtue of being a Sosseh (that is, of Gambian origin) himself; the great Griot Gora Mbaye with his strong voice and deep wolof lyrics, displaying his strong links to the tradition of the country; and finally, the then young and talented Bassirou Sarr with his great singing skills. 

Five out of seven overall tracks of Volume 2 feature Bassirou Sarr, a truly exceptional singer. Whether in a ballad or some explosive Mbalax, Bassirou's voice is always full of emotion. But if I had to pick out one song, that would definitely be "Raki". When Bassirou got the chance to finally listen to the song (30 years after its initial recording!), he told me the following story: one night, while performing singing "Raki" in Kolda, he noticed a man weeping right in front of the stage. Suddenly, the man turned to Bassirou and said: "Now listen here, you're not going nowhere! You're staying here and play this song all night long!". 

One of the two remaining tunes, "Rumba Para Parejas", is a great latin cover sung by Assane Camara (Camou Yande). Although in his interview Bassirou admitted that Latin music was not their strong point, this track shows how good performers Dieuf-Dieul actually were. Besides, it is somehow ironic that, after the band broke up, all of its members gradually became Salsa musicians.

Having said all that, I am delighted to announce that Dieuf-Dieul are back together after 32 years, preparing for their first international tour! I sincerely hope this record will contribute to the international recognition Dieuf-Dieul fully deserve.

DIEUF - DIEUL de Thiès - Nianky (Short Edit Version)

Mixed By Hammond Classics
Mastered By Dj Inko
Artwork: Lee Hodges

Yoruba Land

Reissue of ultra rare 7" from cult Orchestre Rail Band with:
- ”Moko Diolo" on side A, a beautiful long trippy deep afro jazz with very funky rhythms sections, great garage sounding guitar and fantastic hypnotic voices!
- “Tama Diyara Mali Deun La" on B side is a massive funky afro track with killer sax solo. For sure a real crowd shaker with killer breaks. 

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Along with the Bembeya Jazz or Orchestra Baobab, the Rail Band of Bamako is one of the most prolific bands in all of West Africa. This legendary orchestra has launched, among others, the careers of Salif Keita, Mory Kanté and Djélimady Tounkara and has bequeathed in just fifteen years one of the most important work in Malian and West African music.

Encouraged by his superiors at the Ministry of Transport, the station master Aly Diallo, remarkable multi-instrumentalist is charged with developing a modern and eclectic band to animate the Buffet of the station.
Named the Orchestre Rail Band du Buffet Hôtel de la gare de Bamako, the orchestra is officially created in October 1969 under the leadership of conductor, saxophonist and trumpeter Tidiani Koné, an outstanding and unsung musician who was both a griot and a jazzman. Nicknamed the “Malian Miles Davis”, Tidiani Koné embodies by itself the wonderful modernity and adaptability of Malian music. His idea was to bring Malian music out of what he felt was the dead-end cycle of Afro-Cuban and European imitations. He also was the first to understand that Salif Keita’s voice was pure gold and did not miss the chance to recruit the young albino singer.

The Rail Band was established to « explore and propel the Mandingo repertoire in order to aim at the neo-classicism of the African chanson ». In combining Mandingo and Bambara folklore, Congolese rumba, and American Rhythm’n’Blues with French Pop and hints of Calypso, the orchestra’s sound became the soundtrack of a golden decade in Mali’s music from 1970 to the early 1980s and paved the way for numerous West African orchestras to follow.

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MORE INFOS / BUY: http://www.gomagringa.com/pd-3049da-7-orchestre-rail-band-de-bamako.html?ct=&p=1&s=1

GG7-004 | Orchestre Rail Band de Bamako "Tamadiara"

A1. Alma Negra - Safari

I remember the day clearly. I was searching for treasures in a record shop in Yaoundé, the Capital city of Cameroon, when suddenly I came across a 7-inch record with a picture of a young man wearing a traditional hat and bearing the marks of several imposing vertical scars on the side of his face, carved when he was just a boy as a reminder of his heritage in the Musgum tribe of the northern part of the country.

The record contained two songs – ‘Gandjal Kessoum’ and ‘Touflé’ – by an artist I had never heard of before named Hamad Kalkaba. Both cuts were raw classics of fuzzed-out bass, pin-sharp horns, built upon the unshakable foundation of Northern Cameroon’s mightiest rhythm: the Gandjal. The shop owner - who noticed that I was listening to the same record over and over again - mentioned that ‘There is another single with a green cover of the same artist, if I am not mistaken’.

Over the next six years I searched for that ‘green cover’ and finally found it in a record collection belonging to an old bar in Parakou in northern Benin. While most of the records had been beaten and worn by a life spent in the jukebox, this one had been sitting in its paper sleeve for forty years, untouched and unplayed, seemingly waiting for us to pick it up and rip the two soulful Gandjal tunes from it, the masterpieces ‘Fouh Sei Allah’ and ‘Tchakoulaté’.

These two records, plus a third simply named ‘Nord Cameroon Rythms’ constitute the entire discography of Hamad Kalkaba. Neglected for decades by all but the most devoted collectors of Afro music, Hamad Kalkaba and the Golden Sounds at long last gathers together the body of work of one of Cameroon’s forgotten geniuses.

But unlike many musicians who emerged from nowhere, recorded a few singles and vanished again, Kalkaba hadn’t disappeared. Far from it. He was a distinguished public figure, a retired Colonel in the army of Cameroon, and a former member of Cameroon’s Olympic Selection Committee. When we tracked him down he was serving as president of the Confederation of African Athletics. And Although Kalkaba’s job kept him busy, and he seemed initially dismissive of the music he’d made as a young man, he turned out to be an enthusiastic ally in this project. He arranged interviews, helped fill in the blanks and, when we finally met him in Yaoundé in 2016, provided us with photographs, lyric sheets and notes.

During the interview Kalkaba explained how the songs recorded in the mid 1970s were part of a movement, a movement initiated by musicians from all around Cameroon who, with the help of keyboards, drum kits and electric guitars, had started to modernise the traditional rhythms of their regions. For Kalkaba it was no different and backed by his band the Golden Sounds, devoted himself to the promotion of the sounds of northern Cameroon.

One of the aims of Analog Africa is to showcase the colourful diversity of styles that exist in Africa and its diaspora and today we are very proud to be able to give these Gandjal tunes their first worldwide release.

Hamad Kalkaba and the Golden Sounds 1974 - 1975

Get the Record here:

Hamad Kalkaba - Astadjam Dada Saré(Leave a comment, tell kalkaba how much you love his song!)

Drunken Foreigner Band plays an idiosyncratic electrified version of the Akha and Lam Lao musics of Thailand and Laos. As their name indicates in its provocatively self-deprecating way, the band could be viewed as yet another bunch of exotica-obsessed white males blindly pillaging a little known indigenous musical treasure. But far from being the work of post-colonial bandits, the band's passionate tribute is based on mostly vocal music learned from cassette tapes gathered by keyboardist Dave Kadden on trips to Southeast Asia. Comprising members of Sunwatchers, Invisible Circle and other experimental Brooklyn outfits, their debut LP will be available January 12th, 2018 on Electric Cowbell Records.