Customer Reviews

Presents the Chisa Years 1965-1975

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There are two types of African music aficionados. There are those who delve deep into the music and unearth gems from across a continent whose musicality has essentially been ignored by the West and there are those who only know Fela Kuti and Hugh Masekela. This record is one that should both appeal to and teach something new to both of those camps.

CHISA was Hugh Masekela's label, both creatively and as a business venture. In partnership with producer Stewart Levine, the label made its name by releasing more than a dozen albums of Masekela's own work and another dozen or so records from The Jazz Crusaders. Neither of those very well-known bodies of work are represented on this CHISA retrospective.

The artists highlighted here represent the more obscure side of CHISA's ventures into Africa. Much of it still involves Masekela as a creative force (The Zulus were he and Levine's group). It also includes unreleased material from notable African artists including Caiphus Semenya, Letta Mbulu, Ojah, and Miatta Fahinbulleh. The overall feel of the record is one of fusion. Masekela's involvement in most of the recordings means his Afro-jazz leanings influence and are influenced by the varying musical stances of those he collaborated with. This record is substantial in that it completes the picture of Masekela's evolution as both a musician and a purveyor of music.

Whether or not you know much about Hugh Masekela's career or not this will probably interest you musically. Through a number of conversations I've had over the last couple of years with a few friends,particularly those living on the West Coast it was made apparent to me that during the 60's and 70's there was a strong musical and cultural cross pollination of soul and funk music as they were really beginning to grow by leaps and bounds with the traditional music of Africa. Some have called the music Afro-beat,afrofunk and especially even in the early years African Soul. It's become very much in vogue since the mid 1980's and is such a staple these days of just about anyone in any style wishing to add a world music flavor to their sound that a lot of people may have forgotton how important and innovative this music was and still is. Not only is a lot of the original music itself hard to come by but this is a collection of Chisa label rarities and unreleased material. Now being what seems like a various artist compilation this album isn't as much that as it is different songs featuring a collective lineup of singers and musicians such as Hugh himself,O.J Ekemonde (whom I was lucky to see live with his Nigerian All-Stars when I was 12 years old),singer Letta Mbulu and members of The Crusaders such as Wilton Felder,Wayne Henderson,Joe Sample and Stix Hooper. Even though the music has a strong unified flavor throughout the songs are also credite to different people:Ojah,The Zulus,Baranta And Miatta Fahinbulleh and Letta Mbulu to be exact and the range of variations on the sound is about as broad.Letta material such as "Mahlaela","U Se Mcani" and
"Macongo" all have a mixture of both 60's Motown and African township sounds;musically and the language of the singing itself. Other songs such as "Tepo","Ahvuomo","Za Labalaba" and "Joala" all showcase a more progressive afro-beat sound similar to what groups such as Osibisa were doing in the early/mid 70's whereas the serious funk/disco elements show up on the openening "Afro Beat Blues",which strong resembles the title song to Hugh's 1975 album Boy's Doin It and who knows;could be an outtake from those sessions. Same goes for the hardcore afro-disco of "Witch Doctor". As a sampler of what was going on within the African music world in the original funk/disco/world music during the most innovative years of those genres from the mid 60s to mid 70's this really gives you the flavor of a certain musical revolution in a certain place.