Tags: Cape Verde

Review: After his first LP Stranger Ja Catem Traboi, Tchiss decided to further experiment with reggae and funana, inspired by the local rhythms of the island of Santiago. Gathering some of the best Cape Verdean musicians of the time, in 1984, together with Ze Antonio on guitar, Bebethe on bass and Alirio on drums, he recorded his second LP Ja Bo Corre D'Mim. An album that sings of a young man far from home, his unrequited love and saudade, the struggles of street life in a foreign land and a world of inequality. Recorded in just 3 days at the Pomodoro Studio in Sutri, the album fully expresses the deep and layered sound of Tchiss' music, where upbeat tempo, powerful vocals and electrifying guitar solos tangle together in a dynamic mix of traditional melodies and cosmic reggae.

Review: Great Cape Verdean singer Cesaria Evora was pretty prolific and put out several still well-regarded albums, from Distino Di Belita to Cafe Alantico via Vox D'amor. Many of them have been reissued recently and next up to get that treatment is Club Sodade, which finds a bunch of her tracks getting a contemporary club rework by a wide array of musicians. It comes on heavyweight red vinyl so is ready for serious DJ deployment. Carl Craig's mix of organic hand claps and fizzing techno synth intensity on his rework of 'Angola' is one of the most well-known cuts here but deep house heads will also know and love Kerri Chandler's percussive take on 'Nho Antone Escarderode.'

Review: Tchiss Lopes - ram name Narciso Lopes - lay down plenty of reggae and funana experiments all in inspired by the local rhythms of the island of Santiago on Stranger Ja Catem Traboi, his seminal debut LP from 1982. It has become a hard to find and expensive cult classic that now gets reissued on vinyl and CD courtesy of Arabusta. It is as energetic, rhythmic and melodic as music gets, with great politically and socially aware conscious male vocals sung in Portuguese. Singer, instrumental performer and composer Lopes release seven albums in all, but this one set the highest standards of his career.

Review: Cape Verdean singer Cesaria Evora became known as "the barefoot diva" because, well, you guessed it, she often used to perform on stage with no shoes on. Her sounds are often classed as world music and she often sang in her native Cape Verdean creole but also on occasion in French and Portuguese, always with a certain melancholic aura. Her Distino di Belita album was a second studio long player with Jose da Silva and it includes a mix of her signature acoustic mournas and electric-coladeras as well as her most popular tunes, the superb 'Nova Sintra' and moving 'Distino di Bilita'.

Review: Tchiss Lopes's Stranger Ja Catem Traboi is as good a debut album as you could ever wish to hear. It is a world fusion of great rhythms, high-energy grooves, politically and socially aware vocals and reggae and funana collisions that brims with life and vitality. It was recorded in Rome after the artist spent 11 months at sea and was drawn from his personal and collective experiences of hardship, education, love and the loss of lives at sea. Though now 40 years old, the album has stood the test of time musically and lyrically and now gets a welcome reissue on CD.