Mark Hudson's one-of-a-kind, world music novel, The Music in My Head , was originally published in 1998. In 2005, Viking published a new, paperback edition. Here's,Banning Eyre's 1998, originally written for the Boston Phoenix, slightly re-edited for Afropop.org.

In 1987, when I first went to Africa to look into local pop music for Afropop Worldwide, I had no idea what the effect of such exploration would be on African music, the non-African public, or myself. Now, after a decade of writing about this music, and three more journeys, including lengthy stays in Mali and Zimbabwe, it is clear that all have been affected. African music has revved into a sometimes maniacal high gear in an effort to reach beyond the small segment of the global audience who got Afropop religion during those years. And I have found that the most rewarding experiences of African music take place in Africa when musicians play for their natural audiences undistracted by all the hullabaloo. If you find that cynical, then brace yourself for The Music in My Head (Vintage Paperbacks) a novel by British author Mark Hudson. Hudson has published two non-fiction books, Our Grandmothers' Drums about his experience living in a Gambian village, and Coming Back Brockens about coal-mining in Northeast England. In his debut novel, he explores the phenomenon of modern African pop music and its discovery/exploitation by outsiders with romantic delusions and ill-fated schemes. The novel appears simultaneously with a companion CD compiled by Hudson, The Music in My Head, Indispensable classics and unknown gems from the golden age of African pop (Stern's Africa). A Volume 2 collection, also excellent, has since appeared.

The narrator of Hudson's novel, Andrew "Litch" Litchfield, has been through the wars. His profound, indeed spiritual, passion for the rawest of African music has lead him into situations beyond his cultural depth, and the bitterness he feels as a result has darkened his soul with a blighted outlook. Yet he keeps coming back for more. That paradox fuels the stream-of-consciousness rantings that run through these pages. Litch's descriptions of places, faces and personalities gush with telling details, and mostly ring true. He gets the sweaty chaos and seeming bedlam of a dancing, drumming street party, but also the boredom of long, hot days where nothing seems to happen, the friendly evasiveness and casual betrayals of Africans, and the pretentiousness of westerners who become drawn to such places.

When he moves beyond pungent, free-flowing descriptions into the realm of analysis, Litch's conclusions are alarming. Musicians, in his view, are incapable of loyalty and will always turn on you in the end. The people responsible for the great discoveries in African music--mostly himself--never get the credit they deserve. Litch has a tendency to take everything personally, and it's important to keep in mind that he is a character, not the author. The reader is not necessarily supposed to like him. Still, there is truth in his dark vision. It may be that no foreigner can ever really play as an equal in an African society. In certain ways, outsiders hold all the cards; in others, the deck is rigged against them every time. If my own experiences have not embittered me as Litch's have him, that may simply be because I approached Africa as a musician and a writer, not as a cultural businessman.

Given Litch's edgy outlook, Hudson must fictionalize settings and characters. The novel takes place in the city of N'Galam, capitol of Tekrur and home to the "greatest singer in Africa," Sajar Jopp. In case you can't tell by reading, the Music in my Head CD's sharp focus on Senegalese music strongly suggests that N'Galam is Dakar, and Jopp is Senegalese pop star Youssou N'Dour. Then there's the self-absorbed British rocker who helps Jopp to reach an international audience and then proceeds to muddle up the Tekrurian's music with heavy-handed theatrics. Need another hint? The rocker's name is Michael Heaven.

These roman à clef aspects of Hudson's story are amusing enough, but what sustains interest in this lightly plotted narrative is Litch's agonizing metamorphosis from true believer to broken man. He starts out reveling in the clamor, the crowds, the colors and even the rank aromas of Africa, but in time he succumbs "in some deep irreversible way to the bleak tristesse, the all-pervading ossifying fatalism and corruption of the tropics." This is Heart of Darkness with gonzo journalism style and a beat that won't quit.

Speaking of that beat, Hudson's CD reveals none of the ambivalence in his novel. It spotlights inspirational moments in the careers of artists who rose during the burgeoning years of African pop in the 70s and early 80s. N'Dour sings two songs, one as a voluptuous-voiced 18-year-old and one as the sophisticated, worldly songsmith he has since become. The Senegalese focus is balanced out by classic tracks from Salif Keita with Les Ambassadeurs International from Mali and Guinea, and Franco, the greatest bandleader Zaire's rich music scene produced during those years. The selection is neither complete nor definitive, but it includes hard-to-find music, and even though six of the twelve tracks were in fact recorded in the 1990s, the entire collection is true to an older spirit of African pop music, the kind of music that hooked Litch, and me, and so many of us, in the first place.

Contributed by: Banning Eyre