Tuesday, August 30 2011
Various Artists: The Rough Guide to African Guitar Legends
The boundary for this compilation is huge, and surrounds all of Africa, a continent with more guitarists and guitar styles than anyone can easily count.
Tuesday, October 12 2010
Various Artists: Roots of OK Jazz
The sound quality of these remastered 78s is excellent and the compilation bears eloquent witness to the development of Franco's guitar style, from brief blasts of sound to the more fluid lines that would become his signature.
Wednesday, August 18 2010
Various Artists: Congo; Pont Sur le Congo / Sénégal; Echo Musical / Côte d’Ivoire; We
The time period covered on these discs should be familiar territory to aficionados of African retrospective compilations, even if some of the bands have been so underexposed outside Africa that they feel like newcomers.
Friday, January 29 2010
Various Artists: Africa Boogaloo: The Latinization of West Africa
Thirteen songs, 55 minutes, and a time frame stretching from 1960 to the end of the '70s were never going to leave us with anything more than a sketch.
Tuesday, September 29 2009
Syran Mbenza & Ensemble Rumba Kongo: Immortal Franco: Africa’s Unrivalled Guitar Legend
A Franco tribute led by Syan Mbenza was always likely to be played with fidelity.
Wednesday, August 5 2009
Various Artists: The World Is Shaking: Cubanismo from the Congo, 1954-55
Honest Jon's is doing something unusual here, taking us back to the early days of the style, opening a window into the years before the Greats came along.
Thursday, September 13 2007
Zap Mama: Supermoon
Despite her obvious admiration for US hip-hop, Daulne's music-making spirit has always been more French than North American.
Friday, May 4 2007
Congo: White King, Red Rubber, Black Death
This film takes viewers back to the Congo Free State of King Leopold II, and the vicious 23-year ordeal the people of that nation suffered for the enrichment of a nation they would never see.
