A Cratedigger's Dream: '60s-'80s Tapes Unearthed by Analog Africa

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A Cratedigger's Dream: '60s-'80s Tapes Unearthed by Analog Africa

This is crate-digging at its best. Samy Ben Redjeb has spent over fifteen years chasing long-forgotten footnotes to unearth master tapes and cassettes from Africa. His label Analog Africa boasts an unheard-of selection of raw, authentic music from all over the continent. A rich and insanely diverse heritage of funk, afrobeat, psychedelic rock, mystic soul, and so much more from the '60s to '80s. Or, in Analog Africa's own words: "the best in both explosive foot-shufflers and hypnotic sauntering treasures from Africa."

By

Tracklib

·

September 21, 2021

“We were fed stuff that wasn’t reflecting the reality on the ground, the sophistication of the music, the advanced way of playing, the futuristic sounds, the dexterity of the musicians,” Analog Africa founder Samy Ben Redjeb told Red Bull Music Academy in 2017. Raised in Germany but born in Tunisia himself, it was Redjeb’s sole mission to unearth compelling histories and present local folklore from his home continent of Africa. Going far above and beyond Western music industry cliches about “African music”—the fact there’s even such a widely-used generic term to describe all the diverse music from 54 countries deep, speaks volumes.

Analog Africa pays respect to each and every one of those rich cultures in music. From kwaito to Afrobeat, and from soukous out of Congo to garage funk from Cameroon. Redjeb: “All my thoughts were aiming towards one task – to make sure I repay a city that has welcomed me with open arms and shed a different light on a country that deserves much more than its reputation, by releasing music that will blow your mind.”

Below we highlight selected artists, records, and stories from the vaults of Analog Africa, as available on Tracklib:

Orchestre Poly-Rythmo de Cotonou

Orchestre Poly-Rythmo de Cotonou

The Featured Download on top of this feature is a song by Orchestre Poly-Rythmo de Cotonou, an all-star band from the West-African country of Benin. “An incredible groove machine and the mightiest funk ensemble in all of Africa,” in the words of the label. Their reinvention of Beninese Afrobeat earned them legendary status in Western Africa. Also because of their impressively vast catalog of over 500 recordings in a little over a decade since 1972.

There’s also a song available on Tracklib by Poly-Rythmo vocalist Vincent Ahehehinnou, who was eventually forced out of the band by their then-manager. His first solo EP Best Woman continued to push his singular take on Afrobeat. That record was forgotten for over forty years until Analog Africa reissued the EP.

The Cosmic Sound of Cabo Verde

Paulino Vieira making use of the "lost" gear (archive photo courtest of Analog Africa)

Another intriguing treasure is Analog Africa’s compilation Space Echo: The Mystery Behind the Cosmic Sound of Cabo Verde Finally Revealed! The backstory is insane: In 1968, a cargo ship packed with synthesizers was on its way from Baltimore to the EMSE Exhibition, the first-ever electronic music exhibition to take place in the Southern hemisphere. But the day of departure, the ship with synths, keyboards, and other electronic music goods of leading brands including Moog, Korg, Rhodes, Farfisa, and Hammond mysteriously disappeared from the radar—until villagers of Cachaço, Cape Verde found one of the containers washed ashore.

According to the compilation's liner notes, anti-colonial leader Amílcar Cabral made sure the instruments were equally distributed to local places with electricity. The gear found its way into the hands of curious children and young adults, which contributed to the modernization of local rhythms like Mornas, Coladeras, and the dance-centric style of Funaná, banned until 1975 by Portuguese colonial rules for its sensuality.

African Scream Contest

African Scream Contest Vol. 2

Another crazy story is one about Lokonon André, singer of Benin's national police orchestra Les Volcans de la Capital. As recalled by Samy to Red Bull Music Academy: “He’s very mobile and he knows the music scene very well, and he said he was going to help me find the artists I was looking for [for the compilation African Scream Contest]. I gave him a list and after a few days, he comes back and he tells me he found everybody. I had spent two years trying to find five of those musicians on the list, so I was very surprised. I said: ‘Lokonon, how did you manage to find these people?’ And he says, ‘Well, you know I was a musician for the police force. Do you remember I told you I went to Russia [with the police]? When I went to Russia I was trained by the KGB in ways of locating and finding people.’ So, basically, Lokonon used skills taught to him by the KGB to locate these musicians! Some of them he didn’t know personally and I don’t know what he did to find out, but he found them.”

Hidden Psychedelic Cumbia

Ranil y su Conjunto Tropical

Ranil y su Conjunto Tropical (Limited Dance Edition) by singer Ranil sees Analog Africa branch out to a different side of the world: cumbia from a city deep inside Peruvian forests, only accessible by a boat trip on the Amazon river. “I like to showcase the rhythms that came to fruition in other parts of the globe and which are the result of a clash of cultures between African and American indians, often also mixing that up with European beats,” explains Samy. “Africans arriving in the Americas was like throwing a match into a barrel of gunpowder.”

As shared in the liner notes, the Peruvian singer and bandleader is a “larger-than-life personality who swirled the teeming buzz of the Amazonian jungle, the unstoppable rhythms of Colombian and Ecuatorian dance music, and the psychedelic electricity of guitar-driven rock-and-roll into a knock-out, party-starting concoction.”

Goldmine for Sampling

"The word ‘sampling’ was a word I was constantly using because that band used to do some incredible loops.”

—Samy Ben Redjeb (founder of Analog Africa) on Le Super Borgou de Parakou

Samy Ben Redjeb at home in Frankfurt (photo: Analog Africa)

“While working on projects I often come to think that African music is a goldmine for sampling. And I am not saying this to please you, it’s something I truly believe,” says Samy. “For example, during the promo campaign for the Le Super Borgou de Parakou, the word ‘sampling’ was a word I was constantly using because that band used to do some incredible loops. Mind you: during live recordings! And their drummer was the reason why Albarika Store, the powerhouse of Benin Music, signed them, that crazy drummer. Le Super Borgou de Parakou is not something that many people catch from the first listen, it's exclusive for those who take their time to check ‘behind the curtains.’ Since too many people want it straight into their face, they´ve missed it and didn’t notice the awesomeness of that group.”

Dig into the full catalog of Analog Africa here. Samy: “We have also released countless of instrumentals. They are very cinematographic; even Tarantinesque at times.”

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