Orchestra Baobab - Pirates Choice [1989] [FLAC]

MOJO Magazine: Buried Treasure "Album That Time Forgot."

Artist: Orchestra Baobab
Release: Pirates Choice
Discogs: 1476609
Released: 1989 / 2001-10-01
Label: World Circuit
Catalog#: WCB 014 / WCD063
Format: FLAC / Lossless / Log (100%) / Cue / CD, Album, Reissue, Remastered
Country: UK
Style: Folk, World, & Country, Jazz, Latin, Afro-Cuban Jazz, Afro-Cuban, Rumba, Latin Jazz

Tracklisting:

1-1. Utru Horas (8:39)
1-2. Coumba (7:42)
1-3. Ledi Ndieme M'bodj (8:54)
1-4. Werente Serigne (6:44)
1-5. Ray M'bele (6:57)
1-6. Soldadi (8:03)
2-1. Ngalam (9:31)
2-2. Toumaranke (6:58)
2-3. Foire Internationale (7:41)
2-4. La Rebellion (7:54)
2-5. Ndiaga Niaw (7:42)
2-6. Balla Daffe (7:18)

For people who know their Senegalese music, Orchestra Baobab's Pirates Choice is the Holy Grail. By the time this music was recorded to four-track in 1982, the immensely popular band had been playing nightly for years at a Dakar club called Baobab. But legendary status in Senegal didn't help the musicians get wider attention--the album wasn't released in Europe until 1987, and it only now comes to the U.S. for the first time. Latin music was popular in Dakar, a port city, and the band mixed various strains of Latin music with different African music styles to create uniformly stunning results not all that different from Afro-Cuban music. The French vocals are lovely, and the powerful mix of African and Latin percussion is undeniable--but keep a particular ear out for guitarist Barthelemy Attisso, whose tasteful leads float over the top. The original six-track album is hard to pass up, but this reissue contains a second disk with six unreleased songs from the same session, making this a must-have. --Tad Hendrickson

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