Random A-List for Set: Africa

Artists from Africa.

Here are 12 A-list albums, selected at random from Set: Africa. Use your Reload button to get more.

Issa Bagayogo: Timbuktu [2002, Six Degrees]
After surfacing as a singer expert on the three-stringed kamalé ngoni droning over a drum machine so spare the naive might call it primitive, he leaves the settings to Ali Farka Toure sideman Koko Dembélé and label owner Yves Wernert, who fashion a world music amalgam slyer and slinkier than any kora fusion. True, there are moments when the production almost drowns in comforting gestures. But the groove always rights itself, and the sound effects are obtrusive enough to give kora fans a salutary case of the jitters. A−

Alpha Blondy: The Best of Alpha Blondy [1990, Shanachie]
Unless some dancehall visionary has escaped notice, this cosmopolitan Rasta is the great reggae hope. Forget Majek Fashek, even Lucky Dube--the African skank of the Ivoirian's Solar System Band makes the Wailers themselves sound a trifle straight. And on half these gloriously hypnotic tracks they get their chance--though because he's an equal opportunity Africanist, he allots them their fair share of weird sound effects and polyglot righteousness. Marcus Garvey words come to pass. A

Dark City Sisters/Flying Jazz Queens: Dark City Sisters and Flying Jazz Queens [1994, Earthworks]
Lumped with the Mahotella Queens when recalled by Afropop historians at all, Joyce Mogatusi's close-harmony Dark City Sisters are far less raucous--more girl-group than big-mama. They offer the best clue yet as to just exactly what the mysterious "marabi" sounded like. Recall if you can the pop-jazz shadings of Dorothy Masuka, and note the three inevitable and excellent Mahlathini tracks--where the Queens compete with the witch doctor, the Sisters stay as sweet as they are. Also, be glad of this: no fewer than seven songs adduce dances--some new, some traditional, some just themselves. A−

Iscathamiya: Zulu Worker Choirs in South Africa [1986, Heritage]
Put off by its ethnographic audio, I shelved this as a field reference until my boundless thirst for knowledge induced me to take it out and turn it up. Whereupon it exploded. Although everything I read says all contemporary South African choruses derive from the "soft" style Joseph Shabalala developed in the '60s, this stuff doesn't come off as cathama ("to walk softly")--sounds like ibombing ("bombing"). It's aggressive where Ladysmith is spiritual, which seems fitting, since its commercial purpose is triumph in all-night hostel competitions. Also worth noting are lyrics that both zero in on broken families, the most galling symptom and symbol of apartheid to black South Africans, and defy the tribalism that's one of its nastiest strategies. A−

Baaba Maal: Live at Royal Festival Hall [1999, Palm Pictures]
"My voice was always very loud but very thin," so this border Tukolor bulked up his God-given instrument with the same conscious discipline that enabled him to attend law school and penetrate Wolof Dakar. But as with so many ambitious young men from the provinces, there's always been an awkwardness about him, and his Chris Blackwell-backed attempts to follow Youssou N'Dour and Salif Keita into the so-called world music market have been cluttered with horns, stabs in the dark, and invited guests. The shows have varied, too, but this four-cuts-in-40-minutes EP is the heart of a good one. It's got a montuno-driven salsa. It's got reggae universalist Ernest Ranglin in Tukolor drag. And everywhere it's got tamas wrangling into the night. A−

Samba Mapangala & Orchestre Virunga: Ujumbe [2001, Sterns/Earthworks]
Cover claims to the contrary, not "fiery stuff"--not by the hyped-up standards of the soukous this eternal exile has now outlasted. That's why it's special, and that's why it's good. Everywhere he's gone, from Matadi to Kinshasa to Kampala to Nairobi to Paris to his safe Maryland home, Mapangala has brought along a tenor as sweet as a licked frenum and a tune sense that knows what it wants--no wonder he found the sway of Swahili swing so amenable. Here he gathers about him a different set of Afro-Parisian hotshots than on his last visit, except for, no stupe he, the two standouts: guitarist Caien Madoka and trap drummer Komba Bellow Mafwalo. "It is bad to criticize people behind their back, especially when they have tried to help you," one trot reads, but who cares? The music carries any message of tolerance you care to verbalize. A−

Youssou N'Dour: Rokku Mi Rokka (Give and Take) [2007, Nonesuch]
Unlike the two previous Nonesuch albums by Africa's premier pop star--the 2002 ecumenical, the 2005 Muslim--this isn't designed to inspire conversion experiences. But believe that its melodicism and vocal dexterity exceed those of whatever contemporary standard-bearer you favor in those realms, that the clarity and range of the singing epitomize what is usually meant by beauty, and that at 48 this Sufihas got him some beats. Having long realized that crossover was most gracefully accomplished by conceptual clarity, he keeps things organized this time out by tending to business at home. On half the tracks a banjo-like ngoni, which this being Senegal N'dour designates a xalam, gestures toward the Malian desert directly to his north, imparting a capering intricacy and folkish flavor to what remains Dakar dance music. To most Americans, however, it will probably just sound like Africa, and pretty darn good. A

Orchestra Baobab: On Verra Ça [1992, World Circuit]
Rarely does Afropop's Cuban connection come out and kiss you on the cheek the way it does on "El Son de Llama," the trad. arr. charanga that sets the mood. Consciously polyglot, the band bends Mandinka and Wolof traditions toward Togo, and Guinea-Bissau, and Senegal's Cassamance as well as Cuba. But these 1978 Paris recordings are suffused with presalsa's elegant charm--the unostentatiously gorgeous arrangements make the less derivative Dakar-'82 Pirates Choice sound too off-the-cuff. Special thanks to guitarist Barthelemy Attisso for the extra melodies and saxophonist Issa Cissako for the messages from earth. A−

Super Sweet Talks International: The Lord's Prayer [1995, Sterns]
A.B. Crentsil wanted to be liked, and he was ready to sweet-talk anyone who got in his way. The least of these six circa-1979 highlife tunes is subtly ingratiating, and the charm of the three English-language numbers subsumes the Christian politesse they promote. Then again, "Adjoa"'s quiet 10 minutes of dazzling polyrhythm probably wouldn't be as nice if you could understand the words, in which Ghanaian women are advised to service whatever soldiers are walking around Accra like they own it. A−

A Taste of the Indestructible Beat of Soweto [1994, Earthworks]
Knowing it would be a waste to raid the seminal mbaqanga compilation of the title, which is why his market niche might buy this one (and also why he has a market niche to begin with), Trevor Herman aims to match it out of the half dozen or so less perfect ones that followed. This is self-actualized and public-spirited, and damned if he doesn't come reasonably close. Steve Kekana and the Soul Brothers sweeten the mix, the Tiyimeleni Young Sisters show the Mahotella Queens how Shangaan women call their lover boy, and Mzwakhe Mbuli has the last word. A

Tinariwen: Tassili [2011, Anti-]
The first Saharans to break internationally are forbidding even by the sere standards of the region. But they calm rather than mesmerize, which together with some subtly shameless showmanship helps sell them to peace-out types. Having found 2009's widely praised and supposedly "traditional" Imidiwan too lulling by half, which may be because I joined the caravan before Pitchfork and Entertainment Weekly and is definitely because they should rock out a little, I was disappointed to learn that this one is where they abandon electric guitars. But since there's never been any Agadez ax-god abandon about headman Ibrahim Ag Alhabib, the difference is marginal, especially given the help they've gathered on their first album for Epitaph's alt-trad label: Tunde Adebimpe and Kyp Malone on guitar and/or vocals on five of the 12 tracks, Dirty Dozen Brass Band on a sixth. The collaborations are subtle but telling, as are Alhabib's deep melodies. Not "desert blues." Sadder than blues--too sad to be merely calming. A−