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Recent Reviews
Les Amazones de Guinée Wamato Stern's, 2008
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Ever wish your favorite band from African pop music’s “golden age” (basically, the 60s and ‘70s) could come back to life and make just one really well recorded album? That’s a little what it’s like to have a new release from the all-women, all-militia Guinea dance band Les Amazones de Guinée. This has to be one of the most talked about but least heard of bands from Sekou Toure’s politically dubious, but culturally inspired, era as president of Guinea. In their day, Les Amazones shared the limelight with Bembeya Jazz, Balla et Ses Balladins, and Keletigui et ses Tambourinis. They were hailed as “Queens of Africa,” and “Goddesses of African Music,” and they shared the stage at FESTAC in Lagos in 1977, perhaps the most storied African music festival ever. For all that, Les Amazones recorded only one album, Au Coeur de Paris, in 1982, and you will be hard pressed to find a copy of it anywhere.

A quarter-century later, surviving members of the original band have teamed up with talented sisters (even daughters!) and traveled not to Paris, but rather Bamako, Mali, to record these twelve, sharp, spirited tracks. The first thing that hits you is the session’s sheer vibrancy and energy. The rhythms snap, the guitars weave an eloquent thicket of melody, the saxophone brass section sounds warm and tight, and the voices of these women are powerful, as one would expect from the country that produced Mory Kante, Sekouba Bambino Diabaté, and many other West African superstars. As a number of post-Buena Vista Social Club producers have discovered, it is not necessarily easy to rekindle the musical fires of a vintage band decades after the fact. But Ibrahima Sylla is a veteran himself, and you can bet he would not have taken on such a produce unless he know he could make it crack.

And crack it does. The opener, “Wamato,” assails ingratitude with a barrage of intertwined guitars, tight brass, and orchestrated voices. “Djama” delivers fierce, loping Mande pop with stinging guitar work and featuring the majestic voice of Aminata Kamissoko. The Mande sound is strong through much of this set, but other Guinean traditions also emerge, as on the joyous “Zawi,” a rootsy, 12/8 shuffle showcasing the voices of the folk trio Zawagui. “Alhamdoulilah” too comes through with levitating roots rhythm, contrasting the voices of M’Mah Sylla and Fatou Nylon Barry, one sharp and supple, the other rough and earthy. The only misfire in the set is a well-meaning but syrupy Happy New Year to the children of Africa—a forgivable flaw.

Lyrically, the set includes lots of praise: for Guinea, the women of Africa, and the late leader and guitarist of Les Amazones, Nyépou Haba. Nothing bold or controversial here on the message front, but no matter. This is at the very least a winning reenactment of a profoundly optimistic and creative era in African music. It remains to be seen whether the new lineup of Les Amazones will endure. Even if they don’t, this welcome recording will.

Contributed by Banning Eyre for www.afropop.org