Saturday, December 25, 2010

ETOILE 2000: PROVING AFROPOP IS ROCKING TUNAGE



One band I just now discovered, or rediscovered, via the freedomblues website that is in my blog roll is . I'd heard this band via KPFT and KTRU in Houston back in the late 1990's and early 2000's on various shows. This band was together from 1977 to 1980.

Here's a quote of a review from the "Dean of American Rock Critics" Robert Christgau:

Etoile 2000
Etoile 2000 [Dakar Sound, 1996] A-
See Also:
Etoile de Dakar
Youssou N'Dour & Étoile de Dakar
merge all
Consumer Guide Reviews:Etoile 2000 [Dakar Sound, 1996]Imagine a bunch of garage musicians whose main technical limitation is that they grew up too poor to own instruments. Two genius guitarists clashing, three drummers beating the hell out of each other, crazy sax man coming and going, and then, because this is a garage band only in theory, two singers who can outwail the average gospel strongman, never mind the average Iggyphile. That's this short-lived, hot-headed Senegalese crew, who undertook the literally garage-recorded "Boubou N'Gary," all unkempt echoplexed fuzzbox and excitable tama, to give their old boss Youssou N'Dour what for, and began hearing it on the radio--constantly--about two hours after they'd finished. None of the other five tracks is quite as intense or chaotic. But this will shut up anybody who believes Afropop is too slick and anybody who believes it's too primitive simultaneously. El Hadji Faye, we salute you. A-


and another review from AllMusic

Biography
by Chris Nickson
Sounding as if they were the Yardbirds set down in Senegal and produced by Lee Perry, Etoile 2000 enjoyed a brief lifetime on the Senegalese music scene -- but the influence lingers on.


The immediate roots of the band are in Étoile de Dakar; the group formed in 1977 after a number of musicians split from the venerable Star Band, which had been in existence since 1960 and which was the root of modern Senegalese music. Étoile de Dakar enjoyed the talents of two excellent vocalists, a young Youssou N'Dour and El Hadji Faye, in addition to guitarist Badou N'Daye, whose Hendrix influence showed in his very electric stylings.

For two years the band was the toast of Dakar and Senegal's most popular band, playing all over the country. But inevitably rivalries occurred and in 1979, Faye and N'Daye split to form their own band, with the backing of businessman Mass Diokhane, who ran the Jandeer Club where Étoile de Dakar had usually performed.

The band rehearsed in Diokhane's garage, and one night he taped the song "Boubou N'Gary." After playing all night, the musicians took a breakfast break and Diokhane sent an assistant to radio station ORTS with the tape of the song. Once played, it proved so popular that it was replayed all day long and the DJ, Golo Gaye, christened the band Etoile 2000. Over the next two days the band recorded three more songs for their initial release, still on Diokhane's primitive equipment, which sold a reputed 5,000 copies on the day it appeared in Dakar stores.

With a screaming fuzz pedal, Faye's high griot voice, and liberal use of an echo chamber as their stock-in-trade, the band played frequently around Dakar and recorded two more cassettes, some tracks of which referred back to the Cuban sound which had long been popular in Senegal, others looking to the young, popular m'balax rhythm, filtered through their own personal lens.

After just three years, the band folded, but their memory is still alive in the CD Dakar Sound, issued in 1996 on the Dutch CNR label, which compiles tracks from all three of their releases, the wild "Boubou N'Gary" also appearing on The Music in My Head sampler.

HERE'S A LINK ON YOUTUBE WHERE SOME WHITE FOLKS GET STUCK IN THEIR JEEP IN THE DESERT, BUT THE SOUNDTRACK IS BOUBOU N'GARY.

COMPELLING RHYTHMS.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=slRFffyYinU


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