Various: Musiques Metisses: Le Sahel (Marabi)

 |   |  <1 min read

Mounari Mitchala: Talou Lena
Various: Musiques Metisses: Le Sahel (Marabi)

When the Buena Vista Social Club burst into public consciousness every major record company starting looking at its catalogue -- and wondrous to report, they too had recorded Cuban artists down the decades!

Suddenly Cuban music was everywhere.

The sceptical among us might look at this compilation of "desert blues" from the Sahara which has arrived in the wake of global success of artists like Tinariwen, Malouma, Vieux Farka Toure and Etran Finatawa (all of whom have featured at Elsewhere over the past year or two).

Well, the Marabi label behind this collection is also the one which brought those people to attention so they get my vote as the one to have a few bragging rights and pull together a compilation (their earlier Marabi Africa collection is tagged below).

So here is an excellent overview which includes all of those mentioned plus more than half a dozen names which I am sure will become familiar over time.

The sound of Sahara blues is quite compelling, let this collection be your guide into it if you aren't already in there.

Share It

Your Comments

Gavin Hancock - Dec 8, 2011

This sat on Trade Me taunting me to buy it for about a year...I'm glad I finally did. Excellent intro to the sounds of the Sahara plus it's from the equally excellent Marabi Productions which is almost a guarantee of quality.

post a comment

More from this section   World Music from Elsewhere articles index

Kamel El Harrachi: Ghana Fenou (Mosaic/Ode)

Kamel El Harrachi: Ghana Fenou (Mosaic/Ode)

By coincidence Elsewhere here acknowledges the son of another music master in the same week as we pick up the album by Jakob Dylan. Kamel El Harrachi is the Paris-based son of the late oud... > Read more

Hossam Ramzy: Rock the Tabla (Arc Music)

Hossam Ramzy: Rock the Tabla (Arc Music)

With the kind of diverse guests only this acclaimed Egyptian percussion player could call on -- jazz drummers Billy Cobham and Manu Katche, A.R. Rahman (aka "the Mozart of Madras",... > Read more

Elsewhere at Elsewhere

ELLEN SHIPLEY. ELLEN SHIPLEY, CONSIDERED (1979): I'll show you the hit, you show me the money

ELLEN SHIPLEY. ELLEN SHIPLEY, CONSIDERED (1979): I'll show you the hit, you show me the money

In 2009 when an American journalist wrote about corruption and bad practices in the music industry he was surprised that one of the feedback letters came from a Grammy-nominated songwriter who had... > Read more

Jon Hassell: Dream Theory in Malaya (1981)

Jon Hassell: Dream Theory in Malaya (1981)

When I imported this album in 1981 it was on the basis of faith: faith that the Melody Maker writer who had hailed it was on the money, that Brian Eno who appeared as a collaborator and on whose EG... > Read more