sat 07/12/2024

CD: Vieux Farka Touré - Samba | reviews, news & interviews

CD: Vieux Farka Touré - Samba

CD: Vieux Farka Touré - Samba

The fiery music of a country under threat

The river of sound from Mali never stops flowing. War in the Sahara and the constant threat of Jihadists haven’t stopped the ceaseless wave of creativity that surges through the West African country.

The Malians speak of music giving courage, of song’s capacity to warm hearts. Vieux Farka Touré’s latest in a line of splendidly "encouraging" albums is guaranteed to move, get you up on your feet. and celebrate. The Touré family aren’t griots or praise-singers but members of the warrior caste, and their hereditary vocation is palpable in the great power of their music.

A massive counterblast to the uptightness, puritanism and hypocrisy of fundamentalist Islam

This music surges from the soul with unrelenting force, as on songs such as  “Samba Si Kairi” in the gently lolloping mode now commonly known as "desert blues", and made famous by Vieux’s father Ali Farka Touré: the guitar and ngoni playing woven together with great delicacy, in subtle and seductive conversation.

There are some extraordinary solos, as on the up-tempo “Bai Kaitere”, reminiscent in their intense wildness of Hendrix or Prince at their very best, a rich and mind-bending guitar sound produced by a combination of reverb and delay. On stage, this kind of material, playing on repetition, has a trance-inducing quality. Vieux Farka Touré and his fellow-musicians summon the spirits of Northern Mali, and are carried by the spiritual force that survived the horrors of the slave trade and was reborn in gospel, blues, soul and rock.

Vieux Farka Touré takes us to the sacred heart of rock’n’roll, a spirituality that is rooted in sexuality as much as the heart and spirit, and provides a massive counterblast to the uptightness, puritanism and hypocrisy of fundamentalist Islam. It is said that Ali Farka Touré was inspired by John Lee Hooker. His son has listened to the best of rock’n’roll, and this has made it possible for him to re-invent his own ancestral music, as if, in some miraculous way, the dark heritage of slavery had been magically reversed and Africa’s song revitalised by an infusion of pain-soaked energy.

@Rivers47

Vieux Farka Touré takes us to the sacred heart of rock’n’roll, a spirituality that is rooted in sexuality as much as the heart and spirit

rating

Editor Rating: 
4
Average: 4 (1 vote)

Share this article

Add comment

The future of Arts Journalism

 

You can stop theartsdesk.com closing!

We urgently need financing to survive. Our fundraising drive has thus far raised £33,000 but we need to reach £100,000 or we will be forced to close. Please contribute here: https://gofund.me/c3f6033d

And if you can forward this information to anyone who might assist, we’d be grateful.

Subscribe to theartsdesk.com

Thank you for continuing to read our work on theartsdesk.com. For unlimited access to every article in its entirety, including our archive of more than 15,000 pieces, we're asking for £5 per month or £40 per year. We feel it's a very good deal, and hope you do too.

To take a subscription now simply click here.

And if you're looking for that extra gift for a friend or family member, why not treat them to a theartsdesk.com gift subscription?

newsletter

Get a weekly digest of our critical highlights in your inbox each Thursday!

Simply enter your email address in the box below

View previous newsletters