Filed under: Angola
The music of Angola usually does not get the attention that many other African countries receive. The music is a mix of influences from Congolese music from their northern neighbors, Portuguese Fado and Latin Merengue, as well as Cuban and American Jazz. The result can be heard in Angolan merengue (based on Dominican merengue), kilapanda and semba – the last being a genre with roots intertwined with that of Brazilian samba music.
Os Bongos have been featured on a three compilations. The song “Lena” can be found on Soul of Angola: Anthology 1965/1975 and “Kazucuta” appears on the album Angola 70s: 1974-1978 – both on Stern’s Music. “Kazucuta”, as well as the song “Pachanga Maria”, will be on the upcoming compilation Angola Soundtrack on Analog Africa. The only information I was able to find on the band, is from the press release for Angola Soundtrack: “Boto Trindade, guitarist of Os Bongos, abandoned his dream of becoming a football player to support his brother’s family by earning money as a musician.” Having seen the other packaging for previous Analog Africa releases, I am sure that the booklet that will accompany this compilation will have plenty of information…
Catalog number R: 1207 on Rebita, pressed by Fadiang (also known as Rádio Reparadora do Bié) in Silva Porto for Discoteca de Angola in Luanda. No release date listed.
Filed under: Thailand
♬ Pee Lok
It’s funny. Over the years, I’ve picked up a few random words in various languages that I see over and over. A good example is ‘bintang’, which is Indonesian for ‘star’ – as well as the name of a brewery in Indonesia. ‘Ngozi‘ is Igbo for ‘blessing’ and ‘hob’ is Arabic for ‘love’. But ‘pee’ is the Thai word for ‘ghost‘. And there are a lot of songs from Thailand about ‘pee’…
The title of this song translates as “Ghost Haunting”, and I figured it was a good way to start off October. I have not been able to find any information on Tuangchai Boonparaksa, other than the song “Mahn Kao Lah” – or “What Fun” – on Subliminal Sounds‘ Thai Beat A Go-Go Vol. 2 compilation. If you have any further information, please get in touch or leave a comment.
Thanks to Peter Doolan from the always amazing Monrakplenthai for the translation.
Catalog number ST-182 on Star Records of Thailand. No release date listed.
Filed under: Lebanon
Just a quick post this week… I’ve been a bit busy as of late, and haven’t been putting in as much time as I need with the site.
So here’s a single I have nothing on, other than it was “Recorded and mixed on August 21, 1972 at Baalbeck Studios, Lebanon.”
If you have any information on Abdallah Geahel, please get in touch or leave a comment.
Catalog number EM 115 on Empire. No other information available.
Filed under: Kenya
Of all of the countries on the African continent, I have probably seen more records from Kenya than anywhere else. And that goes for the number of labels as well, especially considering that in many countries one label held a monopoly over all recordings.
Although CBS, HMV, Pathé, Philips and Polydor did release a few singles, the majority of Kenyan recordings were issued on countless small labels that must have only produced one or two releases each. According to the handy KenTanza Vinyl label index, there were over 450 labels that released singles in Kenya and neighboring Tanzania. What? Was there a record label on every corner in Nairobi and Dodoma? It makes you wonder, doesn’t it?
The only information that I have been able to find about the New Sunshine Band is that released one other single on the Sounds Express label. If you any information, please contact me or leave a comment.
Catalog number SUL 7-012 on Sululu of Kenya. No other information available.
Filed under: Upper Volta
♬ Mori
Many of the records that finally find their way into my hands, have had a hard life. I would guess that at least a quarter of the records posted on the site are unplayable. They have scratches. They skip. Scuffs and cracks. Some even have pieces of the record that are missing. But with the use of various computer and turntable tricks, I can usually bring a track back from the dead. Usually…
Finding pristine copies of these records are practically impossible. Yeah, maybe if I travelled to these countries and was really really lucky. Don’t get me wrong, if I could I certainly would. I just don’t have that kind of budget. So due to the scarcity, I’ve learn to live with what I can get. Because, even if the record is beat – I still just want to hear it. I want to know what sounds are contained in that spiral groove.
Now… This record is near pristine – at least, to the naked eye. But, as you probably have already noticed, the audio track tells quite a different story. This record was not damaged by a previous owner or injured in transit. It was just pressed wrong. And the sonic surgery needed to bring this one back from the dead is beyond my expertise. Well, it’s not completely dead. But to EQ the particular frequency where the noise is, would also take out the guitar… Luckily, the noise fades out about two thirds in – just before the guitar solo.
I have not been able to find any information about Barou Kante or L’Orchestre Les Messengers du Promhotel. If you any information, please contact me or leave a comment.
Catalog number VDB 032 on Edition Volta Discobel of Ouagadougou, Upper Volta – now known as Burkina Faso. Pressed in Benin, no release date listed.
Filed under: Laos
I just got this single today, so I’m sure the translation is wrong and will have to be corrected later… I wanted to post it anyway just because Laos is such a blank slate, even though it really doesn’t fit in here…
As I have mentioned before, compared to their neighbors – Cambodia, Thailand, Vietnam, even Burma – no one really ever mentions Laos. Even amongst my fellow record collectors – um, I mean fellow archivists – there just isn’t a whole lot of information. The general censuses was that there wasn’t anything, and what little of what may have been was most likely destroyed by the Pathet Lao after they overthrew the government. But that seems to not be the case.
I was recently contacted by Chanthara Outhensackda. He is the gentleman on the cover of the first single from Laos that I posted back in September 2007. He was head of the studio for Lao National Radio from 1968 to 1975 in Vientiane. And, he recorded all of his songs in Laos – not in Thailand as some people have speculated. So there was something going on there. Some of which, you can listen to here.
Catalog number KSD 6604 on the Sat-Dtree Laos label. No other information available.
Filed under: Egypt
♬ Umm Kulthum • Amber of the Nile
♬ Saïd Darwish • Arabesque
There’s been more than a few records that I have posted on this site that have made me question who the intended audience was when it was released. This one is right up front about it. It’s says it right there on the cover: “a holiday souvenir”.
But one of the most annoying things about this record is that there are no artists listed. I have seen another version of this release that did list who did what songs, and I happened to have written down that Saïd Darwish was credited for the version or Arabesque… But the other track – which did not write down – required a bit more research
Eventually, I had Hany Zaki play name that tune for me. On the record, the track is listed as Amber of the Nile, but it is actually an excerpt from a much longer piece by Umm Kulthum called Lelit Hob, or Night of Love. Kulthum – who has almost as many variations on her name as Muammar al-Gaddafi – was know as the Star of the East (kawkab el-sharq). More than three decades after her death, she is still recognized as one of the Arab world‘s most famous and distinguished singers of the 20th century. But also of note was that the legendary Egyptian guitarist Omar Khorshid – who I believe is the guitarist on this track – got his start playing in her orchestra.
Catalog number 18-75171 on Sono Cairo records of Cairo, Egypt, released 1975.
Filed under: Rhodesia
Rhodesia was an unrecognized state that existed between 1965 and 1979. The landlocked country bordered South Africa to the south, Botswana to the southwest, Zambia to the northwest and Mozambique to the east. The state, which is named after Cecil John Rhodes, was governed by a predominantly white minority government until 1979.
Throughout its history, Rhodesia continued to be referred to by the British, who did not recognize the state, as “Southern Rhodesia“. Before 1964, the name “Rhodesia” had referred to the territory of modern Zambia and Zimbabwe; however, when the former colony of Northern Rhodesia renamed itself Zambia on independence in 1964, the colony of Southern Rhodesia changed its name to simply “Rhodesia”. However, the change had not yet been officially ratified when Rhodesia declared itself independent, and as a result, the British Government continued to refer to the breakaway colony as “Southern Rhodesia” throughout its existence, a stance it maintained regarding the June–December 1979 successor state of Zimbabwe Rhodesia. Therefore, when Zimbabwe Rhodesia returned to colonial status from December 1979 to April 1980, it was as “Southern Rhodesia”, which, according to Britain, it had never ceased to be called. Southern Rhodesia subsequently gained international recognition of its independence in April 1980, when it became the independent Republic of Zimbabwe.
I have not been able to find anything about The Traffic Lights. The single was recorded by Crispen Matema. Matema was a well known producer who recorded Thomas Mapfumo as well as Mapfumo’s band – the Hallelujah Chicken Run Band. If you any further information about The Traffic Lights, please contact me or leave a comment.
Catalog number MBE 13 on Mberi. No release date listed.
Filed under: North Korea
♬ 만겸화
What do ethnomusicologists and Cultural Revolutions have in common? They both hate rock and roll.
Now, I’m sure I’m going to get a lot of static for that comment. I know there are of plenty of folks working in ethnomusicology – including a few close friends – who don’t actually hate rock and roll. But a good number of those in the field are searching for music that has not been contaminated by Western influences. And on the other hand, you have Cultural Revolutions – be it political or religious – where in most cases anything remotely Western was destroyed.
Music is, and has always been, the product of cross pollination from the beginning of time – back to the beginning of civilization. The Portuguese introduced the guitar pretty much everywhere they went. The Germans unloaded a ship load of accordions into Latin America, forever changing the rhythms of their music. Brass instruments from Europe were shipped all over Africa. In more recent times, synthesizers have pretty much taken over the planet… And let’s not forget about Radio.
Once the Radio introduced, music from the around the world bled across borders to influence people who would have not normally heard that stuff to begin with. And it’s those collisions of cultures that produce some of the most amazing music – at least to my ears. Only in the most totalitarian states has Western influences been shut out. And when that happens, you get something like this.
Catalog number ㄱ – 809804 ᄆ– 28017 / ᄆ– 28018 on the Korean Gramophone Record label of Pyongyang, in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. No release date listed.
Filed under: Iran
When I started putting together the box set that eventually evolved – some would say mutated – into this site, there was practically nothing on pre-revolution Persian pop music. No information, no recordings, no nothing. I did manage to find a Fereydoun Farrokhzad CD that had one of his old singles on it and a CD-R of Mehrpouya‘s first album. Also at that time, Psyche Van Het Folk had a fairly limited page of information. But that was it.
But in the last few years, there has been a small but somewhat steady stream of releases that have become available. First was the Raks! Raks! Raks! compilation on Discos Raks. Not too long after, the Persianna label mysteriously appeared and released compilations of Golden Ring and The Rebels, as well as Mehrpouya’s Jumbo Africa album. And then last year, Finders Keepers‘ Pomegranates compilation was released.
This single is by Aref & Ramesh, and I am pretty sure the backing band was Golden Ring – who backed Aref on a number of his early singles. Both Aref and Golden Ring have been covered previously on this site, but I have not been able to find hardly anything on Ramesh. In the liner notes for the Pomegranates compilation, she is referred to as “This elusive rocker has been spotted in 70s teen-zines in Iran decked in everything from paisley-pretty to biker-chic“.
Thanks to Gökhan Aya for the translation of the Farsi.
Catalog number AJ 4303 / RT 2286 on Royal of Iran. No release date listed.
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