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secretradiobrooklyn · 4 years

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SECRET RADIO | Aug.31.20

Inaugural edition of WBFF, secret radio Kensington Brooklyn (Hear it here.)

Before it comes up: No, we don’t speak most of these languages. We definitely don’t even know how to pronounce most of the song titles. And while we keep reading up on em, some of this stuff we’ll never know. And that’s fine. That doesn’t need to slow us or you down. If you dig it, you dig it!

So here’s what you’re listening to, and detailed notes below:

1- T.P. Orchestre Poly-Rythmo de Cotonou w Sagbohan Danialou- The Kings of Benin Urban Groove 1972-1980 - “Gbeto Vivi”

T.P. stands for “tout poissant,” or “all powerful,” and right from the jump you can hear why this band is so exciting: it’s pure funk and pure Africa at the same time — super funky drums all wound in hand drums, a royal horn section, and an electric guitar holding down the rhythm stabs. The fact that you have no idea what he’s talking about barely even matters. It’s amazing how the song moves between an African dominance and a Western dominance from section to section.

2- CBC Band - Saigon Rock & Soul - “The Greatest Love”

This is exactly the tone that I always wanted the term “acid rock” to mean. Every instrument is so hot it’s melting over the other instruments. The organ is such a classic West Coast flavor, the whole band takes every opportunity to go crazy together, and the vocal is a truly mysterious character. But in the end, anyone can sing along to “yeah yeah, yeah yeah, yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah,” yeah?

3- T.P. Orchestre Poly-Rythmo De Cotonou Benin - “Mille Fois Merci”

Apparently, in the ‘70s one of the things that started happening with records in the Benin region was that the bands would not only write super badass songs, but when it came time to record, they would skip the spaces between songs and just record the whole side in one unbroken flow. It certainly sounds like that’s what happened with “Mille Fois Merci” — where we start is definitely not where we end up, though it’s not even clear, without close listening, when we shift into the song with the chorus lyrics. One of the best elements of African music is that influence is flowing in from France and America in completely different ways, and mixing more in Africa than they ever seemed to in the US. “Mille fois merci” = “a thousand thank yous.” So many great guitar parts over the course of the song, all wound tightly around each other, alternately improvising and contributing to the drone underlying huge passages.

4- Vicky & T.P. Poly-Rythmo - “Au Bord de l’Eau”

Vicky is one of the central members and I think songwriters of T.P., and he’s constantly getting call-outs from the other members of the band. This song’s melody reminds Paige of:

5- Sylvie Vartan - “La Plus Belle pour Aller Danser”

In the movie “Peppermint Soda,” there’s a scene in which all of the schoolgirls have gone bonkers, singing this song and clapping and dancing on their desks, and the teacher has no control over the class at all. This is the song they’re singing.

6- Cambodian Rocks - Volumen 1 - Sinn Sisamouth - “Quando, My Love”

I love the drum machine — Optigan? — throughout, but the guitar playing is what just drops my jaw every time. It’s so Les Paul in its fluid inventiveness, shimmering and sliding through the song until it crescendoes and dissolves into light. Meanwhile, all I can picture is a dark, mostly deserted bar verging on last call, on the forgotten edge of an army base deep in Cambodia, where this guy and his guitarist deliver a timeless memory that can never be sufficiently described or even remembered, only ever conjured in a cloud at the edge of sleep.

7- Gasper Nali - “A Bale Ndikuwuzeni”

“Punk Rock meets Tropical? Music is everywhere.” That’s the tag on the YouTube video that I ran across a couple of years ago, and damned if that’s not exactly the thing. I must’ve watched the video of the singer playing his giant one-stringed instrument a dozen times the first time I found it. How can one dude on a beach encapsulate the feeling of playing in a punk band? It’s the essentialism. I did eventually find a video of him doing this song in the studio, and it turns out that the version he has in his head includes beautiful harmonies and a delicacy that is completely absent from the video filmed at Nhakta Bay in Malawi — but this version to me is the real one.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bdhoeK9Gs34

8- Newen Afrobeat feat. Seun Kuti & Cheick Tidiane Seck - “Opposite People”

Another one that is enhanced by watching the video. The drummer looks like he’s 16 years old, but his patterns and fills are just unstoppable, and as everyone plays you can pretty much smell the studio funk. The bent-note keys solo is Cheick Tidiane Seck. So much percussion! And the vocals don’t even kick in until the ninth minute, but when they do, it only gets even better.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mFSRCG4DrmI

9- Jambü e Os Miticos Sons Da Amazonia - Magalhaes e Sua Guitarra - “Xango”

10- Dougbé Antoine et l’Orchestre Poly-Rythmo - Ye Ko Gni Me Towedea

Antoine Dougbé is one of our all-time favorite composers. This track is such a freakin banger — the funky drums, the guitars, the keys, all the sweat flying everywhere. “Legends of Benin” is an absolutely essential collection, and Dougbé’s tracks are the standouts. The arrangements are by Melomé Clement, whose work we’ve been getting into as well. Dougbé was, according to Melomé, a Vodoun priest who referred to himself as “The Devil’s Prime Minister.”

11- T.P. Orchestre - “Se Ba Ho”

This band was known by more than a dozen names and played on tons of records. This track is from an Analog Africa collection of T.P. Orchestre songs called “Echos Hypnotiques,” which is great from beginning to end. Check out the video of them playing this song live on TV — when the dude cuts loose on the Farfisa it’s a clinic!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M0c34HLss-w

12- Mulatu Astatke - Tezeta

We don’t know much about this guy except that he’s Ethiopian. This song has a sense of such delicate, fleeting beauty.

13- Amanaz - “Khala My Friend”

Amanaz stands for Ask Me About Nice Artistes from Zambia, and that sense of sincerity seems entirely appropriate to this Dylanesque track. There are more great tracks where this came from.

14- The Velvet Underground - “Sweet Jane” (demo)

How could we not, after “Khala My Friend”? This is an early demo version. I love the snare hits in the first verse.

15- T.P. Orchestre - “Malin Kpon O”

This is just a perfect example of Beninese and American rock sensibilities. Also from “Echos Hypnotiques.” It’s so gotdamn hip with its funk guitar and discordant keys that slip into a heavy, hooky chorus. It’s so rockin!

16- T.P. Orchestre Poly Rythmo de Cotonou & Bentho Gustave Titiou - “Gbe Sou Ve Gnin (La Vie Semble Facile Mais…)”

I feel like this is the first track we found on our own, without the (invaluable) help of Analog Africa and other able curators. Bentho Gustave is T.P. Orchestre’s bassist and built into the core of the band. This track comes on with some reggae-ish aspects, but to me it’s ultimately completely different thing. The singalong choruses just feel so good, like the best night of the summer.

17- Hallelujah Chicken Run Band - “Tamba Zimba Navashe”

Analog Africa’s second release was this collection of tracks from the great Zimbabwean band. It includes b-sides and stuff plus a studio album — a lot of the African tracks were recorded live or outside at night or in variously improvised settings, but this one was in a classic studio setting. The whole album is full of 3s against 4s and interlocking rhythms, but this track’s endless tumble is somehow special. I always think that the singer’s voice has the timbre of Tupac Shakur, which makes me like him so much. This whole album feels like it could be a hit today.

18- Francis Bebey - “Sanza Tristesse”

19- Francis Bebey - “The Coffee Cola Song”

Surely our electronically oriented friends have been hip to Francis Bebey for years, but this guy’s whole body of work has been a revelation to us. He was Cameroonian, living in Paris and working at the embassy there before he quit to work on music full time. Though he was a librarian of traditional African music and architecture, he believed that African music was absolutely alive and part of the future of music, and needed to not get bogged down in Western versions of “authentic” music untouched by other influences. His albums and collections are, so far as we’ve found, all full of true weirdness and insight — if you need a place to start, “African Electronic Music 1975-1982” is it.

20- Assa-Cica - self-titled - “Mi Man So Gbeme We Fide”

21- Assa-Cica - Echos Sonores du Benin - “Yokpo Wa Non Kpo Ha Mi”

“Echos Sonores du Benin” is the first physical record that we actually tracked down and bought online. “Yokpo” was the song that convinced us we had to have it. This summer, when the record finally arrived from Benin to our place in the woods, we spent the day assembling a table and chairs outside on the porch, so that we could invite our friend Brad over for the first listen among the fireflies and the hooting of nearby juvenile barred owls. The title translates from Yoruba to “I Couldn’t Help You.”

Man, this performance is a showstopper.

22- Yol Aularong - Cambodia Rocks Volumen 1 - “Whiskey Whiskey” (House of the Rising Sun)

This guitar tone absolutely slays, and gets right to the heard of “House of the Rising Sun,” whether or not the Cambodian lyrics have anything to do with New Orleans (I don’t think they do).

23- Marijata - “No Condition Is Permanent”

It’s been fascinating listening to music in so many other languages — no matter how many hooks the song has, if you can’t sing along, there’s just a different thing happening in the brain. So when we get to a song like “No Condition Is Permanent,” it really digs in deep. Luckily it’s also not just an excellent song but a very relevant one too. As far as I can tell this is a phrase that originates in Nigeria, though Marijata is from Ghana. This song is a stone classic. When they’re trading phrases in the middle, right before the singer just goes off the deep end, it feels like it has always existed and is never going to end.

24- El Rego - “Feeling You Got”

And straight back to James Brown. El Rego’s got the shriek, he’s got the attitude, and he’s got the… accordion? Yes indeed, the accordion. Wow. I honestly didn’t know the accordion could be funky til this track. I love how it feels like he learned the syllables but may very well not speak English at all.

25- Hailu Mergia - “Wede Harer Guzo”

Speaking of accordion, apparently that is Hailu Mergia’s instrument, though it sure doesn’t sound like an accordion to me. The story of Hailu Mergia is inspirational, in the proof that you can’t always keep a good musician down.

FYI, there are 5 minutes of dead air at the end of this “broadcast.” Chalk that up to learning as we go.

See you next time. Stay healthy, stay safe, stay friends!

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