Classic rock? On Radio Wave?

Nigeria Rock SpecialFoto: Soundway Records

Get ready to rock!!! Classic rock from the '60s through to the '80s... Wait - are you listening to the wrong radio station? No, it's a tour of African rock re-releases, including garage rock from Zimbabwe, psychedelic rock from Nigeria, and punk from South Africa. Also, lots of classic funk, especially from Benin.

Yes, there were rock scenes all over Africa from the 1960s onwards. This week's show pays tribute to classic African rock, mixed in with recently-rereleased gems from the Beninese voudou funk and Ghanaian highlife scenes. 

A short guide to the featured music scenes 

CazumbiFoto: Eva Novak

Garage rock: In the 1960s, people all over the world were picking up instruments, jamming in their garages, and developing their own lo-fi versions of the new sounds coming out of cities like Detroit and Liverpool. This wasn't just happening in Europe and North America: bands in Mozambique, Angola and the Congo were doing it too, and No Smoke Records have rereleased some of these early rock recordings. By the 1970s, production quality was improving and some of the music was developing its own distinctly African edge, as we can hear from Rhodesia/Zimbabwe's Green Arrows. 

Nigera 70: Lagos JumpFoto: Tomáš Konopka

Psychedelic rock: It's a recurring Friday Ripple claim that Lagos, Nigeria, went through some sort of weird time warp in the 1970s, producing music that was fully 30 years ahead of its time. Here we're focusing on the psychedelic rock underground, and will try to deliberately confuse you by saying "Yeah, some of this stuff really does sound like an African Sonic Youth and Beck." Most of the recent rereleases come from Soundway Records, with a few more tracks from Strut Records. 

Voudou Funk: Voudou, Vodun or (as it is best known in Western culture) Voodoo is a West African polytheistic religion. It comes with its own musical and rhythmical stylings, and these are central to the unique funk of the West African nation of Benin. In recent years this scene has finally been getting the international recognition it deserves, thanks mainly to the work of record label Analog Africa (which also brought us the '70s Rhodesian/Zimbabwean garage rock mentioned above). 

Highlife: Ghanaian big-band music since the 1900s, highlife is usually characterised as a fusion of traditional West African dance music and American jazz - but the tracks here showcase some of the more blues/rock-influenced end of the style. Again, all the featured songs have been rereleased by Soundway Records. 

Punk: South African punk from the late '70s to the late '80s was the ultimate in dissident music: an outspoken antifascist punk underground in the middle of a fascist regime. (We've been here before on the Friday Ripple - check out Friday Ripple 15.05.2009 on the Wave Jukebox, and National Geographic's review of the show). Two of the era's most enduring classics have been digitally re-released this year by Rhythm Records. First there's the stunning 1982 debut from multiracial punk/reggae outfit National Wake. The new expanded version of this album, with bonus tracks, is titled Prague Set - because it includes music that first reappeared right here on Radio Wave in Prague! From the other end of the decade, 1989 post-punk classic The Black Tape by Koos has also been reissued with bonus tracks, under the title Koos. 

Discovering more classic African rock 

Unusually, this week we're providing links to record labels' websites (above). This is because there are only a small number of labels worldwide officially rereleasing classic African rock music - give 'em your love and your money! These are small independent labels, run by serious fans who have gone through literally thousands of lost records, and are officially rereleasing the very best songs to an international market. Most of the CD rereleases are lavishly packaged, with rare photographs and extensive background information about the artists and their music. 

However: only a tiny fraction of the hundreds of thousands of '60s and '70s African records get officially rereleased. For the rest, there is a thriving internet subculture of music blogs dedicated to sharing lost African albums. File-sharing is a rather difficult thing to discuss on public radio, so here is a... 

Public service announcement 

Orchestre Poly-RythmoFoto: Handout Alaska State Library

Downloading copyrighted music from blogs is illegal. Even if the record is long out-of-print and impossible to buy legally; even if the record company that originally released it disappeared three regimes ago; even if nobody knows whether the original copyright-holders are alive or dead, it's still illegal. So, if you want to dig deeper into 20th Century African music scenes, by all means check out wonderful blogs like Electric Jive, With Comb and Razor, Likembe and Matsuli Music, and read the authors' fascinating articles on long-lost albums, but for heaven's sake don't actually download anything - that would be illegal. Blog links are posted here in the expectation that, when you see the sheer volume of lost music in the scenes covered here, you will want to buy official rerelease compilations as your next step. (I can safely encourage you to download free Beninese funk MP3s from Analog Africa though, because it's run by the same guy who runs the record company which has licensed the music). 

That said... 

While the relationship between file-sharing and the music industry's present crisis is still a controversial topic, the situation in this particular area of music is clearer. 

The internet, and file-sharing blogs in particular, have played the biggest role in creating renewed interest in these music scenes in the 21st century. Most of the best-known blogs have a clear policy of never sharing albums which are commercially available - meaning that here, the record industry and the music blogs effectively complement each other. 

The young record labels featured in this week's show are not only surviving but thriving. They all have one thing in common: they are small, independent labels rereleasing carefully-selected albums. It is no coincidence that, while staff in the mainstream music industry fear for their futures, one of the first new record companies to launch in 2010 will be the hotly-anticipated Matsuli Music, run by the writer of the renowned South African blog of the same name. 

Here's the Friday Ripple's classic (African) rock playlist:
Ofo the Black Company - Allah Wakbarr (Strut Records)
Action 13 - More Bread to the People (Soundway Records)
Colomach - Cotocun Gba Gounke (Soundway Records)
Os Rebeldes - Murder By Contact (No Smoke Records)
Kriptons - Billy Boom (No Smoke Records)
Green Arrows - No Delay (Analog Africa)
Asiko Rock Group - Lagos City (Soundway Records)
Koos - In Detention (One F Music/Rhythm Records)
Koos - Sing Jy van Bomme (One F Music/Rhythm Records)
National Wake - International News (Rhythm Records)
National Wake - Wake of the Nation (Rhythm Records)
Gnonnas Pedro & His Dadjes Band - Dadje Von O Von Non (Analog Africa)
El Rego Et Ses Commandos - Feeling You Got (Analog Africa)
Bongos Ikwue - Woman Made The Devil (Strut Records)
The Immortals - Hot Tears (Strut Records)
Impacto - Knock On Wood (No Smoke Records)
Orquestre Veve - Venus (No Smoke Records)
Conjunto De Oliveira Muge - Suspensa A Un Filo (No Smoke Records)
H2O - Rien De Mots (No Smoke Records)
Green Arrows - Towering Inferno (Analog Africa)
Antoine Dougbé - Nou Akwuenon Hwlin Me Sin Koussio (Analog Africa)
Le Super Borgou De Parakou - Congolaise Benin Ye(Analog Africa)
Gabo Brown & Orchestre Poly-Rythmo - It's A Vanity (Analog Africa)
Orchestre Poly-Rythmo De Cotonou - Mi Ve Wa Se (Analog Africa)
Orchestre Poly-Rythmo De Cotonou - Noude Ma Gnin Tche De Me (Analog Africa)
The Wellis Band - Bindiga (Soundway Records)
The Big Beats - Mi Nsumauau Bo Daunn (Soundway Records)
The Cutlass Dance Band - Hwehwe Mu Yi Mpena (Soundway Records)
Dr Adolf Ahanotu - Ijere (Analog Africa)
Elcados - Ku Mi Da Hankan (Soundway Records)
Gaspel Lawal - Kita Kita (Strut Records)