The Malian singer/songwriter and guitarist Fatoumata Diawara emerged in 2011 with the EP Kanou and quickly after came her debut and breakthrough release Fatou (Nonesuch, World Circuit). Fatou, which features Diawara's self-penned songs and electric guitar playing (which she claims was a first for a Malian woman) catapulted her to international fame. She has a unique sound, created out of her Southern Malian wassollou roots and Western music she learned growing up in Paris.
In 2012, she teamed up with Damon Albarn and appeared on his Africa Express Tour, and the two musicians then collaborated on Albarn's Gorillaz 2020 release Desole. They have teamed up again for her new album, her fifth, London Ko, which releases this week on the Wagram Music label. Albarn co-wrote six songs on the new 14-track album, which features a host of interesting collaborators, notably, the Cuban pianist Roberto Fonseca on Blues, and Nigerian pop star Yemi Alade on the dancefloor filler Tolon. The official single and MV Nsera features Albarn and some amazing, striking Afro-futurist costumes and images, which reminded me of the work of contemporary African photographers like Aida Muluneh and Wilfred Ukpong.
Diawara has collaborated on albums and singles with a wide range of artists, from (my favourite African band) Orchestra Poly-Rythmo de Cotonou and Roberto Fonseca to Ethiopian jazz giant Mulatu Astatke and Bobby Womack. She is also an accomplished actor with many screen credits (see her performance in Lutz Gregor's Mali Blues. Highly recommended).
Fatoumata Diawara's London Ko. (Photos: John Clewley)
Two recent African releases pair perfectly with Diawara's new album: the reissue of Zimbabwe's pioneering Hallelujah Chicken Run Band's legendary album Take One (Analog Africa), and the reissue of Ferry Djimmy's mid-1970s Afrobeat masterpiece Rhythm Revolution (Acid Jazz).
In the early 1970s, Rhodesia was in crisis as an independence movement grew in opposition to British colonial rule and local musicians were playing a mix of Western covers, afrobeat, rock and Latin rock. The desire to localise their music led them to transcribe mbira (sanza or thumb piano and the iconic instrument of the majority Shona ethnic group) to electric guitars (with a touch of Congolese rumba guitar riffing) and this led to the creation of chimurenga or "music of the struggle". Perhaps the most famous chimurenga musician is Thomas Mapfumo, who now lives in the US, but the early movers in this new genre were the wonderfully named Hallelujah Chicken Run Band.
The band was formed in the early 1970s by young trumpeter Daram Karanga to entertain copper miners (readers interested in Zimbabwean music should check out gumboot from musicians and dancers in the mining regions of the country) and they rapidly gained popularity, winning a national music competition in 1974. Their peak was in the mid-1970s when they won numerous gold records for their singles, especially two that changed the course of popular music in Zimbabwe, Ngoma Yarira and Murembo. Mapfumo took it on from there and paved the way for a new generation, led by the Bhundu Boys in the 1980s, to up the tempo and create jit music.
Hallelujah's music is infectious, with its intertwining guitar lines, mesmerising high-hat-driven percussion and deep vocals, and always makes people dance.
Hallelujah Chicken Run Band's legendary album Take One.
Another legendary and rare reissue is Rhythm Revolution by Benin's ambassador of cool Ferry Djimmy, now out on the Acid Jazz label. Djimmy recorded the album in 1975 after working in Paris. For a while he worked as a policeman, moonlighting at night as a musician. Benin's Marxist leader at the time saw great potential in Djimmy's music to publicise the government's politics, so he gave the musician money and a record label (Revolution Records) to record a number of singles, which as with many African albums at that time led to a compilation, Rhythm Revolution.
If you like the hard-edged and hard-hitting sound of Nigeria's Afrobeat pioneer Fela Kuti, then this album will be of interest. The deep funk groove that powers all the tracks on this amazing album never lets up. Highlights include the Hendrix-influenced rock of Be Free, the bass and sax-driven Carry Me Blak and the beautiful soul-inspired Love Love.
Amazingly, Djimmy played many of the instruments himself on the singles he released. And the album was not a commercial success -- perhaps Djimmy was ahead of his time. The album languished for 50 years before the good folks at Acid Jazz Records rescued this marvellous album and reissued it last year. Highly recommended.
John Clewley can be contacted at clewley.john@gmail.com.
