MANU DIBANGO: AFRICAN SHAKEDOWN

Manu Dibango: African Pop Session + Aphrodite Shake
From African Voodoo (PSI, 1972)

Ok – so people were asking about more top shelf records; here’s probably one of the first ones I got my hands-on. I copped this – I kid you not – from a record store in the United Arab Emirates. Not in person but even for an interweb find, it was still rather remarkable, especially since it cost me $20, including shipping. (It typically goes for a little bit more).

African Voodoo is basically a library-style record of instrumentals done by Manu Dibango of “Soul Makossa” fame and it is, I’d say with some confidence, his funkiest work, by far. “African Pop Session” is some dark, blaxploitation score for midnight stalkers while “Aphrodite Shake” drops a nice, smoky Afro-Latin groove – dig how they pan the congas and drum kit in separate channels.

So why not post this earlier? I actually had planned to at one point but then noticed it had shown up, in full album form, on other blogs. That took the proverbial wind out of the sails, not just because I’ve been beaten from the punch (which I could care less about) but rather, once a $400 record becomes just another download, part of its unique magic dissipates. Under those circumstances, I’d rather post up something more meaningful to me, personally, than “check out this rare record I have” (especially when it’s not so rare once it becomes more mass available). Ah, but such is the reality of music going online. Hope folks (who haven’t already downloaded the whole album[1]) enjoy this still.

[1] That sound you hear are a thousand hands searching Google Blogs.