World Massala

Manu Chao was probably the first internationally recognised artist to really nail world fusion – from his early days rocking out with Mano Negra to the hugely successful Clandestino solo album. He managed to successfully fuse political snippets with soundbites from his travels and, although it was a simplistic, utopian world vision, he got away with it. Lisbon-based Terrakota, led by Angolan-Portuguese singer Romi, are certainly ambitious in the scope and range of the music they cover. On this, their fourth album, they tackle Punjabi Afro-reggae, interlacing Portuguese, Spanish and English lyrics with gentle reggae riffs, the twang of the Indian sitar and occasional African ngoni lute. Add to the mix Afro-beat and influences picked up on their travels in Brazil, Cape Verde and Cuba and you get an idea of their ‘world citizen’ musical status.

But whether they manage to get away with convincingly combining all of the above is debatable. Three of the album’s African songs are genuinely beautiful and melodic: the Maghreb-influenced ‘Chelo Habibi’; the bluesy ‘Pé Na Tchon’ on which Romi’s voice is allowed to shine; and the gentle ‘Né Djarabi’. But one gets the sense that the band are just a bit too eager to cram in as much as possible and the rest of the album is sadly hit and miss, in particular the English-language songs. On ‘Slow Food’ (an ode to eating well), vocalist Júnior ends up listing the contents of his fruit bowl: ‘Tomatoes, pimientos, mango, watermelon/Banana, potatoes, carrots, power all over’. Oh dear.