Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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21 of 23 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A gem !, April 10, 2007
This is a gem.
Bassekou Kouyaté is Mali's leading player of the ngoni, a simple desert lute that looks like a stocky cricket bat.
It's West Africa's oldest string instrument and the ancestor of the banjo.
Cognocenti may know Kouyaté for his contributions to Ali Farka Touré's magnificent last album, "Savane", but here he's centre stage as leader of a ngoni quartet.
In a way it's possible to think of this as sophisticated chamber music with intricate lines delicately interweaving plus the female vocals of Ami Sacko and Zoumana Tereta.
One of the most gorgeous tracks is an instrumental with Toumani Diabate on kora even more entrancing than those Toumani did with Ali Farka Touré.
Laid-back music of the highest order.
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10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
one of the best recent records coming out Mali, May 29, 2007
For fans of the late Ali Farka Toure, Bassekou Kouyate's virtuous ngoni playing should not sound completely foreign, as he has appeared on quite a few songs on Toure's amazing posthumous album Savane. Some other familiar Malian musicians were also featured on this wonderful record, including kora player Toumani Diabete. These beautiful instruments provided an intricate, organic, and extremely beautiful backdrop to a variety of vocal styles. For fans of Malian music, this is especially a rare treat. Segu Blue calls to mind recordings of Ali Farka Toure, Toumani Diabete, and Amadou & Mariam, without resorting to simple imitation. From start to finish, Kouyate and his musicians managed to pull off an album that's both upbeat and melancholy, melodic and hypnotic, traditional and inventive. Everything including blues, a psychedelic jam session, and even an Asian sensibility are being evoked. In my opinion, this record should appeal to anyone who enjoys good and authentic music, period. Hopefully, US distribution will pickup so price will come down.
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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Phenomenal, April 18, 2008
This record is outstanding. I don't know why it hasn't caught on as well as, say, Tinariwen or Salif Keita or Baaba Maal. Maybe these guys haven't been around as long as those others but they are, IMO, as good. That's high praise but they deserve it.
This group develops a warm, organic Afro-beat sound using solely acoustic instruments, as far as I can tell. The pieces have a hypnotic rhythm that is augmented by the rich vocal work (sometimes from female guest singers, other times from the men themselves). The songs seem to average four or five minutes in length but they are the kind of rolling, easygoing tunes that I wish went on forever. In spirit they remind me a bit of Tinariwen, if that means anything to you; they are kind of trance-inducing and dreamy, although the music is multilayered and complex and has, at times, a bite to it. Oh heck--listen to the samples! They describe themselves better than I can describe them. And the samples are perfectly accurate representations of the songs as a whole.
If you have any love of the artists I mentioned above, or others such as Rokia Traore, Pape and Cheikh, Ba Cissoko or Ali Farka Toure, I think you will enjoy this album immensely. Production values are excellent and the album, like most African pop records, is generous in its length (over 60 mins I think).
Highly recommended.
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by Bassekou Kouyate & Ngoni ba 
