649. Baaba Maal and Mansour Seck - Djam Leelii (1989)

















Track Listing

1. Lam Tooro
2. Loodo
3. Muudo Hormo
4. Salminanam
5. Maacina Tooro
6. Djam Leelii
7. Bibbe Leydy
8. Sehilam
9. Kettodee


Review

The anglo-centrism of the modern music world sometimes blinds us to what is going on around us in the world. Fortunately we have what is definitely one of the best albums of 1989 coming out of Senegal here, and it is a pretty amazing album.

Even if you don't like the plaintive voices in the album which might seem to foreign to people more used to a more normal fare of music you can only admire how amazing it is musically and particularly instrumentally.

There is not much to say about lyrics I don't understand the language and it really doesn't matter, music goes deeper than language, at least good music does, and this one does that effortlessly. The guitar playing is amazing in its minimalist beauty, keeping constant rhythms throughout the most alien and beautiful songs. A thing of beauty.

Track Highlights

1. Lam Tooro
2. Djam Leelii
3. Sehilam
4. Bibbe Leydy

Final Grade

10/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

Seck was born into the Griot caste, traditionally of low status and associated with singing, story telling and playing musical instruments. From childhood, Seck has been a close friend of Baaba Maal, and in 1977 the two musicians travelled to explore the musical traditions of Mauritania and Mali.

Maal went to study Music in Dakar, and in 1982, he received a scholarship to study at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris. Once established there Maal invited Seck and two other musicians to join him. They formed a band which became known as Dande Lenol (The People's Voice) and played mainly to the Senegalese immigrant communities of Paris. The album "Djaam Leeli" (1984) is from this early time together. As their confidence grew, they toured in the US together with Seck's first solo release coming in 1994.

Not from this album, but still pretty good, Laare: