Wednesday, June 6, 2007

Peace & Love from/for Cote d'Ivoire

Funk & Rock from Ivory Coast? Why not?

Recent years have been rough on the country and its people. I haven't yet had the chance to visit but imagine that Abidjan (& the rest of the country) has lots to offer. Gathering from this collection of tracks, the 1970s led to interesting musical fusions and influences (from Hendrix to Miles Davis and Frank Zappa). I can't wait to hear Vol. 2 (thanks in advance, Cheeku!) .

Don't have the liner notes with me but I do remember that after the recording Charles Atangana sort of dissappeared. I'm sure the Ivory Coast must have many more undiscovered gems; come to think of it, few/no (?) Ivoiran oldies have turned up on the afrofunk reissues and compilations. Anyone in Abidjan reading this blog?

Two tracks: Onguindo (Charles Atangana & Emitais) & Dogbo Zo N'wene (Armand Pascal Lido & l'Ivoiro Star)

5 comments:

deanosounds said...

Do you know of any shops in Nairobi where you can find vinyl?
I will be there for the next two weeks.

Thanks
Deano

Pieter said...

Hi Deano

Try Melodica on River Road (a block from Tom Mboya street), downtown Nairobi. They still have 45s lying around: you'll have to go through the cardboard boxes (and tolerate dust) but you'll certainly find some goodies (though he's out of Geraldo Pino 45s).

There's also Assanands but they didn't have vinyl last time i visited (May).

Anonymous said...

Pieter,

OMG! Thank you for posting this! I've been looking for the original recording of "Dogbo" for months. A friend of mine was in a ska band about 25 years ago that did a remake of it, and I have that recording, but I wanted to hear the original. They're very similar. I've sent my friend the .mp3 file of the original. Thanks again!

Robin

Anonymous said...

Back in 1983 or 84(?) my friend Gary Croslin, the leader of the US band "Jr Smoots and the Disturbers" recorded a cover of "Dogbo Zo N'wene". Back in the 80's Gary wrote original reggae, ska & African flavored songs, as well as played some tasty roots covers with the band. Sadly Gary died sometime in early 90's, but the three studio recordings, though never released in any form, still live on. And "Dogbo" is one of those songs.

It's wild for me to finally hear the original after all these years. It's also amazing how true to the original Gary kept his rendition. Of course Gary is singing an Americanized approximation of words reminiscent of the 'sound' of the original lyrics.

The Disturber's version of Dogbo can be heard here.

http://www.go2jo.com/?p=197

I will also link back to your post here.

Thanks so much for this musical nugget. :)

james said...

thanks a lot for your blog....

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