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Al Bilali Soudan - Tombouctou

PRESS REVIEWS

“From Timbuktu, as we spell it, four or five male blood relatives shout and expostulate their songs in Tamashek, Songhai, and it says here French and English as they thrash and manipulate their ngoni-like tehardents. Whether conjoining barely coexisting peoples or boosting kind women who are better than they are, both of which they make sound worthy and neither of which they make sound easy, they will get your attention, guaranteed. If you like desert music enough to suspect you've heard it before, you haven't--Tinariwen are showbiz by comparison, Tamikrest urbane, Tartit cute. And should you instead suspect that this noisy, indelicate stuff is the roughest African music ever recorded, that's because you haven't heard their 2012 debut. A-“ Robert Christgau

“The electronic buzz of plugged-in tehardent no longer sounds like the repetition of background music. Now, it starts a fire, fully energized, and with every member at full volume.” Adriane Pontecorvo, www.popmatters.com

“A primordial rock album thousands of years before the concept of rock was ever hatched.” Dennis Rozanski, BLUESRAG mojoworking.com Fall 2020

“wild and untamed” Nigel Williamson, Songlines

“The music retains a similar intensity and urgency while remaining loose and dreamlike. Melodic phrases spiral around and on top of each other while shouts of ecstatic joy and proddings are peppered amid the more traditional praises.” Mike Marcinowski, Afropop Worldwide

"a graceful dance and raw sounding music from northern Mali, whose roots date back to at least the fifteenth century "Francis de Souza - Mixed World Music

“lightening fingered workouts infused with an almost punk-like energy” - Nigel Williamson Songlines #159

5 months on the Transglobal World Music Chart from May to September 2020

Prepare to be blown away by the intesity of Al Bilali Soudan. This music has been performed from at least the 16th century by Touareg griots to celebrate the end of harvest and the changing of the seasons, to encourage warriors and to welcome them back from battles, to praise noble families and to heal the sick. Over centuries this music has evolved through fusion with other ethnic groups.

Al Bilali Soudan are Abellaw Yattara, Aboubacrine Yattara,Mohamed Ag Abellaw, and Thialé Ag Aboubacrine Fathers and sons, uncles and cousins Forgeron, griot, bards From Tombouctou/Timbuktu, Northern Mali The instrumentation is tehardant/ngoni and calabash. Thei traditional repertoire is adapted and improvised at lightening speed, sometimes looping, sometimes lyrical. This is dance music. This is culture preserved. This uplifts people who have fled from their homes due to war and rebellion. This is modern music performed on ancient instruments. Like the polyglot region where they live the lyrics are in Tamasheq, Songhai, French and English.

Their most recent album was recorded in January and February 2019 at Studio Bogolan, Bamako Mali.