Orchestra Baobab: Made in Dakar

Here’s another seamless,
masterful mix of Latin and African pop music from Orchestra Baobab,
proving that their phenomenal comeback album, 2002’s Specialist
In All Styles, was no fluke. Baobab was the house band for Senegalese
government officials during the 1970s, and was renowned throughout Africa
before splitting up in 1985, beset by dissension and the onslaught of
more modern, uptempo mbalax musical style. If their reunion 16 years
later didn’t pack the commercial wallop of the similarly reconstituted
Buena Vista Social Club, neither did they box themselves in a time capsule
and milk nostalgia for their appeal.

The eleven songs on Made
in Dakar were chosen by World Circuits producer Nick Gold (the man
behind both the Buena Vista and Baobab reunions), who opted for a blend
of new tunes and re-recordings of classics from the band’s 20-album
discography. The result is an utterly distinctive olio of Afro-Cuban,
Afro-Latin, and vintage-modern workouts from this supple 11-piece
ensemble. Thus, the lead track, "Papa Ndiay," was a traditional
Senegalese griot number honoring an old king, updated by a precursor
of Baobab in 1968, recorded by Baobab in the early 70s, and now given
another facelift, with vocalist Assane Mboup (a protégé of Youssou
Ndour) wailing away in true West African griot fashion (reminiscent
here of Mali’s Salif Keita).

You simply aren’t going to
hear these type of fusions anywhere else. "Ami kita bay" has the
burnished, flamenco-like guitar and rubbery talking drum of mbalax and
the shoulder-rolling swing of salsa: the band calls it "mbalsa"
music. "Nijaay" is a dual-pronged guitar revelry, moving from the
down and dirty "Secret Agent Man" riff to filigreed Nigerian highlife
style picking to call-and-response between guitar and horn to some fatback
wah-wah in tandem to the high-steppin’ of the rhythm guitar. "Sibam"
is all horns and incredibly expressive talking drums, based on a dance
usually performed at circumcision ceremonies, with scintillating guitar
from the nonpareil Barthelemy Attiso toward the end. "Aline" is
perhaps the only blatant stylistic throwback, a mid-20^th
Century Congolese rumba with weepy vocals sung in Colonial French (Wolof,
Malinke, and Portuguese Creole are the other languages sung on the record).
"Bikowa" is a dreamy calypso, smooth as a sailboat ride. "Ndeleng
Ndeleng" is more powerhouse griot vocals and nasty hollow-body guitar.

Eleven songs in all. Nary a
clunker in the bunch.

Orchestra Baobab
Made In Dakar
World Circuit/Nonesuch

Four and a half stars. ****1/2

See them play at the Dakota on June 30, 2008.