Afrique Victime

The last album by Mdou Moctar, often dubbed ‘the Hendrix of the Sahara,’ was a devastatingly deadly assault by electric guitar. Afrique Victime is more of a sustained aggravated assault; the body-shaking chords and left-handed guitar mastery are all still there to relish but the manic genius and euphoric chaos that made the previous album Ilana (The Creator) so utterly raw and exciting have been replaced by a polished and somewhat more predictable professionalism. Moctar (real name Mahamadou Souleymane) made his name just over a decade ago, leaving behind his village in Niger to record tracks in Sokoto, Nigeria, which were distributed on mobile phone memory cards and swapped by users throughout Africa, as was the main way music was distributed on the continent back then. Moctar has developed something of a cult following since those early days and there’s an awful lot of hype to live up to now.

In a nostalgic throwback to simpler times, Afrique Victime is available pre-loaded onto an old-school Nokia phone (as well as via all the usual methods). The title-track and ‘Asdikte Akal’ keep the promise of the old Moctar: blistering chords, frenetic riffs, pure funkadelic energy influenced by 80s Western rock, delivered with contemporary Touareg style. And the track ‘Bismilahi Atagah’ is a future stadium anthem, if ever there was one. The remainder of the album’s tracks, however, have the tendency to meld into a shifting, shapeless mass. Like the sand dunes of the Sahara itself, Mdou Moctar is still scorchingly hot; he just needs to be careful about overexposure.