Baka Beyond / East to West
Album: East to West   Collection:World
Artist:Baka Beyond   Added:Feb 2003
Label:Narada  

A-File Activity
Add Date: 2003-04-28 Pull Date: 2003-06-30 Charts: Reggae/World
Week Ending: Jun 29 Jun 15 Jun 8 Jun 1 May 25 May 18 May 11 May 4
Airplays: 1 2 1 2 1 2 1 1

Recent Airplay
1. Mar 29, 2014: Music Casserole
Braighe Locheil
4. Apr 24, 2004: Morning Glory
Wandering Spirit
2. Mar 15, 2005: At the Cafe Bohemian
Wandering Spirit
5. Jun 28, 2003: Spherical Sounds
Wandering Spirit
3. Sep 14, 2004: At the Cafe Bohemian
Awaya Baka
6. Jun 13, 2003: Memory Select
An Gwirder

Album Review
Fo
Reviewed 2003-04-26
BAKA BEYOND - "East to West"
Narada World, 2003

This is the Afro-Celtic fusion group's fifth album, blending field recordings from villages in the Congolese rainforest with studio musicians, and mixing traditional African songs with Celtic jigs and reels. Few groups manage to make this sort of fusion work so well, perhaps because other groups keep trying to do it all with electronics rather than letting real instruments work together naturally. This may still be overproduced for some tastes, but it's pretty good stuff. And here's a bit of trivia: since the early '90s, the group has paid royalties to the Baka people for use in community improvement projects.

Fo's Picks: 5 & 9 (also 1, 2, 6, 7)

01. 7:04 - upbeat and uptempo song from Cameroon, nice vocals, rhythms, and flashes of fiddle
02. 5:37 - lovely Scottish song with music led by balafon and kora; pleasant vocal.
03. 5:30 - African percussion and uilleann pipes in a tune from Cornwall
04. 4:39 - another Scottish song with a relaxed Africanized rhythm; churns gently.
05. 5:17 - my favorite: two slipjigs fit seamlessly with a field recording of a tribal dance rhythm
06. 5:34 - lightly funky overlay on a sad Scottish song; it all sort of swirls together.
07. 4:57 - the only entirely original song: sounds like a jam session, very nice and low-key.
08. 4:35 - an Irish reel, with lots of percussion; good fiddling, but it's all a bit fluffy.
09. 5:36 - Jacobite song with nice vocals: everything flows together with perfect smoothness.

[Fo] - 4/26/03

Track Listing
1. Awaya Baka   5. Wandering Spirit
2. Braighe Locheil   6. A Thousand Curses on Love
3. An Gwirder   7. Dans Les Jardins De Baya
4. Ra-Li-O   8. Rakish Paddy
  9. Silver Whistle