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Reviews

Review of Na Drê

Na Drê

Dobet Gnahoré

Contre-Jour

Rating: ★★★★★

There are several distinctive modern musical styles unique to the Ivory Coast, but generally the country is known as a...

Reviewed in issue June/2014

Review of Pasichigare: Mystic Mbira Music of Zimbabwe

Pasichigare: Mystic Mbira Music of Zimbabwe

Chipindura Mbira Trio

Chartwell Dutiro (2 CDs)

Rating: ★★★★

Chartwell Dutiro is the artistic director of the Mhararano Mbira Academy in Devon, England. He is one of the leading...

Reviewed in issue June/2014

Review of My Vote Dey Count

My Vote Dey Count

Yaaba Funk

Sterns Music

Rating: ★★★★

Yaaba Funk are very much a London band: British and European, black and white, mixed-gender and politically engaged but intent...

Reviewed in issue June/2014

Review of Kenya: The Obokano, Lyre of the Gusii

Kenya: The Obokano, Lyre of the Gusii

VARIOUS ARTISTS

AIMP

Rating: ★★★

The area of north-east Africa, between the Nile and the Indian Ocean, is a heartland of lyres - from the...

Reviewed in issue June/2014

Review of Lovely Difficult

Lovely Difficult

Mayra Andrade

Sterns Music

Rating: ★★★

Is it world music? Is it pop? It’s hard to be sure. Sung in French, English, Creole and Portuguese, recorded...

Reviewed in issue June/2014

Review of Libation

Libation

Sierra Leone’s Refugee All Stars

Top of the World

Cumbancha

Rating: ★★★★

A decade after overseeing the sessions for the band’s debut album and supervising the music for the documentary that first...

Reviewed in issue June/2014

Review of The Rough Guide to the Music of Mali

The Rough Guide to the Music of Mali

VARIOUS ARTISTS

World Music Network (2 CDs)

Rating: ★★★★

So, just how does one represent a musical powerhouse of a nation such as Mali in just one CD? Well,...

Reviewed in issue June/2014

Review of Radio Niger

Radio Niger

VARIOUS ARTISTS

Sublime Frequencies

Rating: ★★★

This not the typical Songlines album – for one thing there’s no listing of some of the often brilliant artists...

Reviewed in issue June/2014

Review of Cape Jazz Series Vol 4: Musical Democracy

Cape Jazz Series Vol 4: Musical Democracy

The Cape Jazz Band

Mountain Records

Rating: ★★★

It would be crass to call the Cape Jazz Band ‘South Africa’s Buena Vista Social Club.’ But somebody’s got to...

Reviewed in issue June/2014

Review of Soô

Soô

Habib Koité

Top of the World

Contre-Jour

Rating: ★★★★★

Perhaps it was recording 2012’s Brothers in Bamako with the American bluesman Eric Bibb that persuaded Habib Koité it was...

Reviewed in issue June/2014

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