Rough Guide Sahara

(Collection) - Rough Guide to the Music of the Sahara (Worldisc)
Reviewed by Sadie O., 8/16/05
Saharan music somewhere on the border between traditional tribal and the popular Arab music associated with European immigrants, such as Rai. To my ears, it's more trad than pop. The CD blurb says it includes desert rock and roll - not! There is a wide variety in sound, though - I like 7 best, but 4, 6, 10-13 all have something to recommend them. FCC? As if!
Track times are listed on CD sleeve, so I'll give cultures/locations, as those are buried rather deep in the liner notes.
1. Berber, Morocco/Algeria. Mellow oud at start, then handdrums. Male vocal duet (trading off rather than harmonizing), typical of western North Africa.
2. Mauritania. Plucked instruments, solo fem vox with Arabic flourishes, and fem vox chorus. Changes tempo and dynamics.
3. Mali. Trance-y, chirpy music, male vox with choral response.
4. **Berber/black African slave music. Sweet guitar and hand drum. Lovely alto fem vox and choral response.
5. Tuareg/Berber/Libya Male vox with either fem or youth chorus. Stringed instrument and hand drum, hand claps. Fairly uptempo, a few ululations. Nice, but really long.
6. **Morocco. Gorgeous fem vox w/ hand drum. Subdued, but really lovely. Short enough that it doesn't get too repetitive!
7. ***Morocco. Electric guitar and drums - maybe this is the "rock and roll" piece! Slow, lolling rhythm, tempo increase and ululation midway through (no vox.)
8. Morocco. Very bluesy, electric guitar and bass. Rather harsh female vox w/ vocal flourishes. I confess I'd like this a lot more if she didn't have such a rough voice.
9. Tuareg/Timbuktu. Male call and response w/ hand drum, and a far-away vocal drone. Rather trance-y.
10. **Songhai/Timbuktu. Nice full traditional band, male vox, fem chorus. Closer in sound to some of the more familiar western African trad stuff. 3 minutes in music slows and some spoken word - not in Arabic. 2 minutes later pace picks up and there's some cool instrumentation. Still pretty long!
11. **Niger. Several drums and plucked instruments. Several female vox in unison. Rolling rhythm based on camel walk.
12. **Tuareg/Timbuktu. Sounds like it was recorded in a souk! Cool male vocal instrumentation (human beatbox? SortaŠ) Fun - very "tribal" sounding.
13. **Berber/Algeria. Breathy wooden flutes really conjure up the desert. Male vox sounds like a muezzin - could be reciting the Quran.