Sunday at Bob's #3 - A Most Fruitless Week

Last week's fertile vibes got stopped by a cold. The sun took French leave and my guard was down, one hatless 4AM bycicle ride was all it took to nail my sorry ass in bed. Not enough however, to keep me away from the sunday check-in parade at the hostel reception. So here I am, and here is this week's playlist.

In today's selection we find music from the north of Africa, from different parts of Brasil and from Turkey mingling with each other. The introduction is by the touareg group Tinariwen from the berberophone city of Tessalit, in the north of Mali.

We go on with a track by the Amsterdam based american DJ Suzanne Kraft taken from an album I fancy a lot called Talk From Home. It is an intimate and beautiful experience which requires to be alone and to have some time in my opinion and that is why you won't hear played fully at the reception.

As promised last week, I included some of the priceless brasilian discoveries I have made recently, starting with a magnificent album called Samba do Absurdo inspired by Albert Camus' The Myth of Sisyphus (1942). In the essay Camus introduces his philosophy of the absurd. He states that once we face the realisation of the meaningless of life, it's absurdity, we have two choices: suicide or living the absurd life. Here is a link to a small article that talks about that piece by Juçara Marçal, Gui Amabis and Rodrigo Campos better than me.

Comes right after, another fresh discovery as well from Brasil: Julio Secchin. What a candy of an album, absolute gem if you ask me. From what I got, once again thanks to Google translation tool, it is an album inspired by the Carnival of Rio. However I won't adventure myself in further relative informations relying only on a translating machine I cannot trust a hundred percent.

We enter then an peculiar area of French music, a place where artists borrow openly to Brasilian repertoir. There are countless examples of French songs that are almost direct translations from Brasilian ones. Here is a list. La Rua Madureira is a song by Nino Ferrer that is about a love story broken in a Caravelle crash. Madureira is a poor but very much alive neighbourhood of the north of Rio, the Caravelle airplane was the pride of France's industry at the time the song was recorded. The melody is suspected to be taken from Antonio Carlo Jobim's Insesatez that is suspected to be taken from Chopin's Prélude n°4. It isn't a very famous piece from the singer of Mirza, Le Sud and Looking for You, but in my opinion it is most definitely one of his most powerful.

The playlist features also a track by Anouar Brahem, a very important oud player about who I will probably write more on this blog in the coming weeks. Joachim Kuhn's groundbreaking trio that manages to addition gnaoua music and jazz in a way that lift them both up and makes my heart do backflips. The Sahara version of Neil Young's Dead Man soundtrack, by Ahmoudou Madassane, an album that is worth the detour. 

It ends with two Turkish songs: Cemalim interpreted by Erkin Koray, a song about a woman named Şerife in Ürgüp who married a wealthy man liked by almost everyone called Cemal. But after a couple of years, he was killed in a treacherous attack. His death saddened everyone in town and she was left alone with her son(source). And Anlatamam Derdimi Dertsiz İnsana by Aşık Veysel (Aşık is Turkish for Ashik, a traditional musician and troubadour) which a Turkish friend had the infinite kindness to translate to me as I can’t talk about my troubles to the people who are not troubled.

That's it for this week!

Enjoy
and don't forget, check out time is 10h30.

The receptionist

Playlist:

1. Tinariwen - Intro Flute Fog Edaghan
2. Suzanne Kraft - Never Heated
3. Juçara Marçal/Gui Amabis/Rodrigo Campos - Absurdo 5
4. Julio Secchin - Festa de Adeus
5. Nino Ferrer - La rua Madureira
6. Guerrinha - Gazebo
7. Anouar Brahem, Dave Holland, Jack DeJohnette & Django Bates - Bahia
8. Joachim Kuhn, Majid Bekkas, Ramon Lopez - Enjoy
9. Ahmoudou Madassane - Zerzura Theme II
10. Erkin Koray - Cemalım
11. Aşık Veysel - Anlatamam Derdimi Dertsiz İnsana