Gandadiko (Glitterbeat, 2014)
Malian music fans now have a reason to muddle through the cold dark days of winter with the February 3rd release of Samba Toure’s Gandadiko on the Glitterbeat label. This is a stunning addition to Mr. Toure’s recording career that includes the highly praised 2013 release Albala, Crocodile Blues, Songhai Blues: Homage to Ali Farka Toure and Fondo.
Hitting the musical streets with a potent, powerful collection of tracks, Mr. Toure injects influences from Serge Gainsbourg, Bo Diddley and Tom Petty, as well as pulling inspiration from the sumptuous riches of his native Mali and Songhai musical traditions. Slickly stylized, Gandadiko possesses the razor sharpness of Mr. Toure’s evolving musical vision of the desert blues and the meaty, good-natured feel of the sound of Africa.
Gandadiko, powered by rocking roadhouse guitar licks, underbelly juke joint blues and desert blues familiars like rippling tunes against intricate rhythms, bullies a path past the standards to blaze a new direction for Mali’s blues. One of the problems in recent years with the increasing number of desert blues bands and CDs is that one recording often sounded much like another, where each seemed to be a rehash of an older recording or group. Mr. Toure dispels that trend and carefully re-crafts the sound by dipping deeper into rock, psychedelia and blues with a decidedly sophisticated tone.
Opening a deliciously lanky blues groove of title track “Gandadiko,” Mr. Toure employs some slick guitar licks of his own with the addition of some fiery rhythms and some even slicker kora licks. Gandadiko just gets better with the thrumming and throaty “Wo Yende Alakar,” the bones deep blues of “Male Bano” with its kick ass guitar and kora against Mr. Toure’s vocals and the intricately delightful “Farikoyo.”
The smooth groove set up on “Touri Idje Bibi” is downright infectious against the folksy silk of “Chiri Hari.” Other goodies include the percussive riches of “Gafoure,” the “Peggy Sue” guitar base of “Su Wilile” and the sassy vocals and sharp electric guitar and kora licks of “I Kana Korto.” Gandadiko closes with the pleasantly Malian folksy “Woye Kate.”
Expertly recorded and produced, Gandadiko pulses with the evolving spirit of the desert blues and Mr. Toure has certainly put his stamp squarely on the map and its new roads.
Buy Gandadiko in Europe
Author: TJ Nelson
TJ Nelson is a regular CD reviewer and editor at World Music Central. She is also a fiction writer. Check out her latest book, Chasing Athena’s Shadow.
Set in Pineboro, North Carolina, Chasing Athena’s Shadow follows the adventures of Grace, an adult literacy teacher, as she seeks to solve a long forgotten family mystery. Her charmingly dysfunctional family is of little help in her quest. Along with her best friends, an attractive Mexican teacher and an amiable gay chef, Grace must find the one fading memory that holds the key to why Grace’s great-grandmother, Athena, shot her husband on the courthouse steps in 1931.
Traversing the line between the Old South and New South, Grace will have to dig into the past to uncover Athena’s true crime.
