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[Music] Maurice Louca – Elephantine

/ Rudy Carrera / Leave a comment

Maurice Louca is a 36-year-old composer and guitarist/pianist from Cairo, Egypt.  This work, a co-release by the labels Northern Spy and Sub Rosa Records is his masterpiece; a composition sitting on the apex of psychedelic progressive rock, modern classical, jazz and shaabi music.  Really swinging listening.  From his Bandcamp website:

On Elephantine, his new Northern Spy/Sub Rosa album, Cairo-based Maurice Louca guides a 12-piece ensemble through a panoramic 38-minute odyssey, which he describes as his most ambitious project yet.

One of the most gifted, prolific and adventurous figures on Egypt’s thriving experimental arts scene, Louca has in recent years garnered a global reputation through two previous solo albums and an expanding, evolving lineup of genre-defying collaborations. The Wire called his 2014 sophomore solo effort, Salute the Parrot, “remarkable music—dense, driven and splashed with colour.” In 2017, the self-titled debut by Lekhfa, the trio of Louca and vocalists Maryam Saleh and Tamer Abu Ghazaleh, was praised as an “edgy triumph” in The Guardian and picked by BBC Radio 3’s Late Junction as one of the very best 12 albums of 2017.

For Louca, 36, Elephantine serves as both the pinnacle of his wide-ranging experience and a bold next step in his development as a composer, arranger and bandleader. The celebrated Egyptian visual artist Maha Maamoun has created the album cover art, following her contribution to Salute the Parrot. “There was a blessed thing about the process of making this record,” Louca says of the sessions, held last year in Stockholm and featuring the leader on guitar and piano. “The dynamic between us musically but also as people …What these musicians delivered was really more than I could ask for, Everyone played their hearts out on this record.”

The music—from its pensive lulls through its stretches of hard-grooving hypnosis and moments of avant-jazz catharsis—testifies to that rapport. Best absorbed as a continuous performance, Elephantine’s six individually named tracks nonetheless present striking self-contained landscapes. “The Leper” entrances through a deft use of repetition that Louca gleaned from cosmic jazz, African and Yemeni music and other transcendental modal traditions. (Those who’ve followed Louca’s work might be reminded of the Dwarfs of East Agouza, his mesmeric unit with Shalabi and Sun City Girls’ Alan Bishop.)

“Laika” manages to evoke the minimalists, though on the combustible terms of ’60s and ’70s free jazz; “One More for the Gutter,” on which Louca ingeniously pits one half of his ensemble against the other, albeit in a synergistic way, mines similarly fiery terrain. “The Palm of a Ghost” distills the band to a Cairo-rooted core, featuring stirring spontaneous melodies from oud player Natik Awayez, violinist Ayman Asfour and vocalist Nadah El Shazly. The album’s title track follows, and it too blurs the border between composition and improvisation with gorgeously atmospheric results. “Al Khawaga,” with its colossal ensemble riffs, beautifully dirty swing and impassioned blowing, is an ideal finale.

Elephantine will be released on Vinyl (via Sub Rosa), CD & digital streaming/download (Northern Spy). It was recorded in Stockholm in August 2017 at Stureparken Studios by Ronny Lahti, mixed by Adham Zidan and mastered by Heba Kadry.

credits

released February 1, 2019

Tommaso Cappellato (Drums/Percussions)
Ozun Usta (Drums/Percussions)
Elsa Bergman (Bass)
Pasquale Mirra (Vibraphone)
Piero Bittolo (Baritone Sax/Alto Sax/Bass Flute)
Anna Högberg (Alto Sax)
Rasmus Kjærgård Lund (Tuba)
Isak Hedtjärn (Clarinet/Bass Clarinet)
Nadah El Shazly (Vocals)
Natik Awayez (Oud)
Ayman Asfour (Violin)
Maurice Louca (Guitar/Piano)

Recorded by: Ronny Lahti
(In the Palm of a Ghost) recorded by: Adham Zidan
Mixed by: Adham Zidan
Mastered by: Heba Kadry

[Music] Ginger Johnson and His African Messengers – Witchdoctor

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If Ginger Johnson is a source of inspiration to Afrobeat legend Tony Allen, you know this single is going to be good, and Ginger does not disappoint.  This is raw proto-Afrobeat from around 1967, full of percussive power.  From the Bandcamp site:

In 2015, Freestyle Records re-issued the groundbreaking ‘African Party’ album by the somewhat mysterious figure of Ginger (George Folunsho) Johnson. Recorded in 1967, nearly 20 years after he first arrived in post war London and immediately began performing and recording with London jazz stalwarts Ronnie Scott and Pete King.
Credited by those in the know (including Giles Peterson, Louie Vega, Fela Kuti’s drummer Tony Allen & writer David Toop) as the godfather of Afrobeat, Ginger and his group, The African Messengers enjoyed a varied career as the go to afro-cuban percussion group for recording sessions in the UK, working with Georgie Fame, Osibisa, Madeleine Bell and Quincy Jones – as well as acting us mentor to a young Fela Kuti and members of Cymande who cut their teeth as members of his ensemble. They also performed at The Royal Variety Performance, Ginger’s music featured in the James Bond film ‘Live & Let Die’ and Ginger himself appears on screen drumming in the Hammer Films cult classic ‘She’, and famously performed with The Rolling Stones in Hyde Park in 1969.
Aside from ‘African Party’, and several Hi Life singles released on the Melodisc label in the 50’s, it was thought that there were no further recordings by this hugely influential musician . Eventually, prompted by the attention afforded the Freestyle re-issues – Ginger’s son Dennis Dee Mac Johnson was contacted by was contacted by Uchenna Ikonne, a renowned African music collector, who told him he had discovered one rather battered original copy of a 45 single, released in the mid 70’s on the short lived ‘Afrodesia’ label,

For Record Store Day 2019, Freestyle are proud to release the 2 tracks on a fresh vinyl 45. ‘Witchdoctor’ is not the track of the same name on African Party, but it and ‘Nawa’ (written by Dizzy Gillespie cohort Chano Pozo) demonstrate a musical progression as funk had stamped it’s indelible footprint on Ginger’s music along with afro-cuban rhythms and jazz.
Thanks to Claudio Passavanti at Doctor Mix Studios in London, who has done quite an amazing restoration and re-mastering job on this long lost music.
Watch ‘The Story Of Ginger Johnson’ mini documentary by clicking HERE!

[Music] Siti & The Band – Fusing the Roots

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Tanzania, as a whole, has amazing musical diversity.  Siti & The Band hail from Zanzibar, and you can hear the deep Arabic influence in their music.  From their Bandcamp website:

Zanzibar, the mystic island and home to world renowned musicians Siti Binti Saad and Bi Kidude as well as the Festival Sauti za Busara and Zanzibar International Film Festival, is proud to have born new voices to carry on the cultural legacy and mystic connected with this island:

Siti & The Band – a unique live experience, fusing traditional Taarab instruments, melodies and rhythms with western influences, are releasing their album “Fusing the Roots” early next year and are looking forward to tour in EA to present a very special musical experience!

“Fusing the Roots” is recorded evidence of the timelessness of Zanzibar’s traditional and contemporary music. The high quality recording, empowering lyrics and unique musical compositions of the album have beautifully entangled contemporary rhythms with Zanzibar’s most loved classical genre.

“I have been watching them play over the last several months and their progress is stunning. Siti and the Band are a group of musicians who know what they are doing and who are doing it well. Remembering the past and facing the present without fear is the only way tradition can remain vibrant. The music of Siti and the Band puts this idea into action.” Adrian Podgorny, Director Dhow Music Academy

“A wonderful performance and amazing experience: especially to hear this accomplished musicians and great arrangements in Fumba where Siti Binti Saad was born almost 150 years ago and we are building a new town now, is something I didn’t expect to happen”
Tobias Dietzold, COO Fumba Town Development, Zanzibar

[Music] Brant Bjork – Jacoozi

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I have no problem admitting that I am a fan of stoner rock, desert rock and other neo-psychedelic and metal-related genres of music.  Among the best bands out there in the beginning of said genres was Kyuss.  The band’s drummer and multi-instrumentalist Brant Bjork has gone on to make some of desert surf’s most brilliant albums.  This one was birthed by a trip to Joshua Tree, California, where he panned a project he was working on and went back to improvising drums.  After jamming and getting the sound he wanted, he simply layered and layered until this masterpiece was carved out.  Not at all what I was expecting, this is a great record to simply groove to.

[Music] Ciro Berenguer – El Mar De Junio

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One of Eilian Records’ finest releases to date, Argentine-born, Barcelona-based composer Ciro Berenguer releases a very ambient guitar album.

From Eilian’s Bandcamp page:

Ciro Berenguer is a guitarist and composer from Argentina who has lived for many years in Barcelona, Spain.  He likes both traditional and nontraditional ways of playing the guitar: processing the sound through many electronic devices or playing just the guitar alone.  Two facets of his playing expressed in a handful of albums and collaborations, from standard guitar music to a more experimental and improvised way of making sounds, enjoying both approaches.

[Music] Ed Carlsen – The Journey Tapes (Deluxe Edition)

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I grew up with piano music in my home because my mother, grandmother and great-grandmother (a violinist by trade) were fond of the instrument.  I would grow up hearing piano music, dated a pianist in Italy for a brief and stormy moment, and even here in China, I’m surrounded by it.

It pleases me to no end that piano music continues to be revolutionary.
Montreal’s Moderna Records is at the forefront of putting out the best of cinematic, minimalist piano music, and Ed Carlsen’s music has proven to be my current favorite of their bunch. For those familiar with Yann Tiersen’s music, Ed’s compositions will feel familiar. These are wispy, thought-provoking pieces which make you want to break out the blanket and coffee and sit by the window on a chilly day.