When Tendai Maraire broke down his Pungwe mixtape for us last year.

I remember when Zimbabwe gained independence. My mother had a big party at the house in Seattle — with all her friends, Zimbabwean and American. My uncle, who fought in the guerrilla war against the white Rhodesian state, flew in weeks later. She started celebrating every year and even would get together with friends to sponsor groups from Zimbabwe to come and perform. Years later she focused more on performing, and non-Zimbabweans took over. They called it a Marimba festival and later transitioned it to Zimfest, which still exists. One year, my brothers and I went when my father was still alive living in Zimbabwe. After we came back, we saw that it had not represented our culture, history or the people indigenous to Zimbabwe. So we started flipping tables etcetera. The festival was stopped and dialogue started on how things needed to change. I promised that day to everyone that I would change it.

See, Zimbabwean music has a rich story-telling history. Some songs have messages that are inappropriate for those of European descent to sing. But yet they still feel comfortable doing so even though Shona people feel this way. So ‘Boom’ is me throwing my first punch at those that still disrespect the music. While I touch on some subjects that personally affect me when they do it. Boom!" Here is the video for the mixtape's second track, "Boom": http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bmuKI5d9p2Q    

5 new documentaries this week. Crop: Talking About Images is a film directed by Marouan Omara and Johanna Domke. The film, quoting its website, "reflects upon the impact of images in the Egyptian Revolution and puts it in relation to the image politics of Egypt's leaders. Instead of showing footage from the revolution, the film is shot entirely in the power domain of images -- Egypt's oldest and most influential state newspaper Al Ahram." From the top-level executive office down to the smallest worker, the documentary follows a photo journalist who missed the revolution due to a hospital stay. Here's an excerpt:  http://www.vimeo.com/52194528 Même pas Mal (No Harm Done) is a film by Nadia El Fani and Alina Isabel Pérez that follows up on El Fani's 'Securalism – Inch’Allah'. The tone in 'No Harm Done', according to first viewers, has become darker, the director’s attitude noticeably more radical. "This may be due in part to her personal history: her cancer, the operation, chemotherapy on the one hand, paralleled by the unprecedented radical Islamist hate campaign against her film in Tunisia, which culminated in death threats against the director published on the social networks." French-Tunisian Nadia El Fani received the best documentary film award at Fespaco this year. The film hasn't been screened in Tunisia yet. Nor can the filmmaker return home. http://vimeo.com/45506794 The documentary Creation in Exile: Five Filmmakers in Conversation follows Newton Aduaka, John Akomfrah, Haile Gerima, Dani Kouyaté and Jean Odoutan: five African filmmakers in the diaspora (Paris, Washington, London, Uppsala), their everyday lives echoing sequences of their films. A film by Daniela Ricci: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KiktFIXBP5c Returning the Remains ("A Khoe Story 2") is poet, writer and filmmaker Weaam Williams and Nafia Kocks' 50 minute documentary about the history of the "unspoken of genocide" on South Africa's Khoe/Khoi people. "The most challenging documentary film we've ever made," Williams describes it in a recent interview. Here's a first clip: http://www.vimeo.com/52990200 On a lighter note, Geoff Yaw's King Me explores the world of competitive checkers play as seen through the eyes of South African Lubabalo Kondlo. In 2007, Kondlo, with the help of some sympathetic Americans, traveled to the U.S. to compete in the U.S. National Championship of Checkers in Las Vegas, Nevada. A relative unknown in the legitimate checkers world, Kondlo crushed the competition and earned the right to challenge 20+ year reigning World Champ, Ron 'Suki' King: http://vimeo.com/36505480

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ahvRbLEnGj4 Congolese (Brazzaville) filmmaker Rufin Mbou Mikima has uploaded* his latest documentary "Tsofa" to YouTube. The film tells the story of a group of Congolese men, many of them highly qualified university graduates who got offered a 600 euro/month job by a Romanian company to go and work as taxi drivers in Bucharest, the European country's capital. "To Romanians, black people living in their country must be either football players, or students," Mbou Mikima notes in one of the film's opening scenes. He first met the group back in 2008 while working in Bucharest himself. Through the use of the men's own photos, mobile phone images and other video material, he retraces their initial steps, hopes and expectations, where it went wrong (it did), and what happened after the return of some of them to Congo (Brazza). Conversations, interviews, voice-over and subtitles are in French and Lingala. (No English subs, unfortunately.) The result is a sensible document. Bonus: music by Fredy Massamba.  * Update: "had" it uploaded; it's been set to private now. Désolé. Replaced it with an opening scene.

Another month, another special Africa issue. This one is by French weekly newspaper Courrier International (part of Le Monde group), edited by Isabelle Lauze and Ousmane Ndiaye. Many of the articles have appeared elsewhere but are published here for the first time in French. Features and profiles include those on Congolese photographer Kiripi Katembo, Angola's "indignados", Senegalese collective Y'en A Marre, Nigerian Nollywood, Ghanaian journo Anas Aremeyaw Anas, Ethiopian entrepreneur Bethlehem Tilahun Alemu, a very short introduction to Francophone Hip-Hop, etc. Full table of contents here. The cover photo is lifted from Omar Victor Diop's 2012 series “The Studio of Vanities”. It's not clear why they decided to focus only on Sub-Saharan Africa. That said, they've used excellent sources.

It is hard to underestimate the importance of pianist Bebo Valdés' contributions to Cuban music. "Bebo", who passed way at the age of 94 in Stockholm, Sweden yesterday, is considered to have been instrumental in "wedding traditional Afro-Cuban dance rhythms with the improvisational freedom of American jazz" (JazzTimes). His earliest performances were in rumba style but his exposure to jazz in the 1930s "altered the course of his music as he adopted the African-rooted rhythms and the swing of the American big bands to his own playing and arranging." In 1947 Bebo took a job as pianist-arranger in Haiti, an experience that he says "increased his knowledge of African-based rhythms." He returned to Cuba in 1948, where he gained fame as the musical director of the Tropicana club in Havana. In October 1952, he did a series of recordings for American producer Norman Granz, a descarga that is considered to be the first Afro-Cuban jazz jam sessions recorded on the island. Following Cuba's revolution in 1959, Bebo left for Mexico, then the United States, and finally Europe where he settled in Stockholm, playing in piano bars and touring occasionally. In 1994, Cuban musician Paquito D'Rivera sought out Bebo for a recording session, released as "Bebo Rides Again". The LP's sleeves has it that this was Bebo's first recording after 34 years (although that is noted as not entirely correct). Once more, some silent years followed this recording, living "a quiet musical existence," as JazzTimes calls it in an older article -- untill the year 2000, when Fernando Trueba brought together some of Cuba's great musicians for the film "Calle 54", and reintroduced Bebo's playing to an international audience.

And this is what YouTube is made for. The film featured this duet of Bebo and his eldest son, Chucho: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zffxPnsUMZg In 2003, Trueba went on to produce the instant classic Lagrimas Negras album, teaming Bebo with flamenco singer Diego El Cigala: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CcpoEazKge4 In 2004 he was again filmed by Trueba for El milagro de Candeal, a film about the role music played in the historically black neighbourhood of Candeal, Salvador (state of Bahia, Brazil). A fragment: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y6iRCAg0iQ8 In 2008, a documentary was made about his life by Carlos Carcas: Old Man Bebo. Here's the trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QLYU7VN1WWU And released in 2010, Chico and Rita is an animated feature-length film directed by, again, Fernando Trueba and Javier Mariscal. The story is set against the backdrops of Havana, New York City, Las Vegas, Hollywood and Paris in the late 1940s and early 1950s and it is inspired by the life of Bebo. The film also has an original soundtrack by Bebo (alongside tracks by Thelonious Monk, Cole Porter, Dizzy Gillespie and Freddy Cole). And here's the nice part: you can watch it in full on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YaDC_BsC2b0 Gracias por la música, Bebo Valdés. R.I.P.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-OBZY46-hb8 Not too long ago, a new video by Amadou & Mariam would have made a bigger splash. There's no way denying their (?) questionable choice to get Bertrand Cantat on board for their latest record has somewhat tempered the global enthousiasm for their music. Which is regrettable -- the end result is a fine record. And the above animated video for 'Africa mon Afrique', produced by No-Mad Films, ticks all the right boxes (including Africa's launching of a "space program"). Next, Congolese artist Didjak Munya's latest single, "feat. Bill Clinton" (yeh), before his album drops. (Via Akwaaba.) Filmed between New York City and Kinshasa:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vn_yzxL3w9U 'Dance For Me' by Ghanaians "Ruff N Smooth" Ricky Nana Agyeman and Clement Baafo is a TUNE: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GkqbQCZf4Vs Something else. Let's get this straight. Tunisian rapper Weld El 15's track below might not be everybody's musical cup of tea, but when the "actress" and the cameraman involved in the making of the controversial 'Cops are Dogs' video are both sentenced to six months in prison for their contribution to the video while "Weld El 15 (himself) remains on the run and was sentenced to two years of imprisonment in absentia," Tunisian government needs to be called out on this loud and widely. Says Weld El 15: “As an artist, I chose the (police's) violent language to criticize their violent behavior and harsh treatment. I tried to express my opinion freely thinking that Tunisia has democracy, yet I was mistaken.” Head over to Les Inrocks for a longer interview with the artist. Surely Tunisia's Ministry of Interior's got better things to do. We'll follow up on this story. http://youtu.be/6owW_Jv5ng4 Meanwhile, back in Nigeria, Ajebutter 22's got other things to worry about. Pastors and stuff: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=89_m06oRbMM Abobolais and his Ivorian crew bring the better coupé-décalé moves this week: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e0gmadlo5tY There's been more than one collective musical effort to unite Mali recently. Here's another one. Featuring: Oxmo Puccino, Inna Modja, Féfé, Cheick Tidiane Seck, Doudou Masta, Rouda du 129H, Ousco, King Massassy, Abbba Mamadou Ba, Lélé, Elie Guillou, Toya, Rim, Ramsès, Lyor, Guimba Kouyaté, Camille Richard, Tanti Kouyaté, Amkoullel l'enfant peulh -- many of whom are based in France: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sG4lEuHeKuA You already know we're a fan of Carmen Souza. Here's a video for her 'Donna Lee': http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KC9hQVGTqSg Nicole Wray and Terri Walker are touring with (AIAC favorite) Lee Fields this spring. Can't wait to see them bring this live: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G3IMPYJ7MiY And to conclude, there's no official video yet for the trans-Atlantic "Family Atlantica" project, but Soundway Records released the following song on YouTube: 'Escape To The Palenque', featuring Mulatu Astatke -- and that will do for this week: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Q5Lf9g-DoU

Born in a small township near Gondar in northwest Ethiopia, Yityish Aynaw recently became the latest Miss Israel. And then made some dumb comments about Ethiopian heritage and beauty. ("We have these chiseled faces. Everything is in the right place,” she said. “I never saw an Ethiopian who was stuck with some big nose.") Which reminded me of the fairly new 400 Miles to Freedom, Avishai Mekonen’s film about Ethiopian immigrants who left their homes to make a living in Israel, and what they found there. It is also about Judaism and race, especially in the United States. Trailer below. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CS_7jsK5JRk Also about migration, but of a different kind, is Comme un Lion ("Like a lion"). Mytri is a young Senegalese football player who's offered a contract and a bright future in France by one of those many talent scouts swerving through West Africa. Once in Paris, that future turns out to be not quite what Mytri imagined it to be. Director Samuel Collardey's style of realism has been compared with that of Ken Loach. One to watch:  http://youtu.be/NKrXZocTal0 (Related: I read Benoît Poelvoorde is working on a similarly-themed film.) Produced by the German Goethe Institute's Sudan Film Factory, Cinema Behind Bars tells a story of cinema in Sudan. Bahaeldin Ibrahim takes the viewer on a journey to Atbara; "Not spectacularly, but quietly and carefully": http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oCnGLKlbkaI Sobukwe: A Great Soul recently won best documentary feature at a Saftas gala best quickly forgotten. Its director, South African Mickey Madoda Dube, also won the best director award. Percy Zvomuya wrote an introductory review of the docu-drama about the life of Pan Africanist Congress l­eader Robert Mangaliso Sobukwe when it first came out. http://youtu.be/Ne6HC2UOW9Y And another documentary to watch out for is Malian director Souleymane Cissé's portrait and homage to legendary Senegalese film maker, writer and philosopher Ousmane Sembène (in the photo left). Title: O Sembène! I haven't come across a trailer yet, but the first reviews (in French) are promising. Like this one for example. Choice quote by Sembène: "Europe is not the center, it is on the outskirts of Africa" ("L’Europe n’est pas le centre, elle est la périphérie de l’Afrique").

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gFz3fSUx8vY We hardly ever feature Brazilian music, and even less their take on Afrobeat. The above tune by the Abayomy Afrobeat Orchestra dates from last year, but the video's new. Hope to see more from them. We've got 9 more videos lined up for you this week. Ugandan duo Radio & Weasel came up with this:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kf-RXTLVeM0 Nigerian artists are flocking en masse to Cape Town's seaboard to shoot their videos (taking cues from Congolese artists ten years ago). Clearly not just for "the light". Davido's 'Gobe' one more example: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kFDu6ACKLKo Lagos' SDC Commandant Obaifeiye Shem's clumsy reply when asked on TV about the address of the website of his Service was that "my Oga at the top" knows it. The rest is history (as is he, it seems). Your viral Naija meme of the week: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQgqEMzzoBg M3nsa and Sena repping it for Ghana: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=iA32dYaYBKU Tanzanian bongo flava from Belle 9 (call it pop): 'Listen': http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oHI6T6KhBh4 Also from Tanzania is duo Aika & Nahreel who got themselves a dance hit with 'Usinibwage': http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T0w6K1bwIGE Kenyan bongo sounds, here's 'Bum Kubam' by Nikki Wa Pili featuring G Nako. Quite the video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=baQu0PYhRe0 More Kenyan Hip-Hop by rapper Rabbit in 'Adisia': http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PzDYqxgSkQU And switching gears, this video by Just A Band: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jxc-zVqituk H/Ts this week to @Birdseeding, @nemesisinc and GetMziki.

"Vers la forêt de nuages" ("To the cloud forest") is a film by Robin Hunzinger, who tells a story about his Ivorian wife Aya and their son Tim (in the image above), travelling in Côte d’Ivoire to pay tribute to Aya's father who recently passed way. The film intends to offer a portrait of and an "initiation" to the country. Follow the production of the project on its Facebook page. Here's a first trailer: http://vimeo.com/60570879 The director of "Pars et Reviens Tard" ("Leave and come back late(r)") Aurylia Rotolo (with help from Xavier Deleu) first met the documentary's protagonist, "Régis," while in Tanger, Morocco. Cameroonian Régis -- a professional football player in his home country -- had plans to make a living in Europe but wasn't gonna risk his life crossing the Mediterranean Sea illegally. When Moroccan clubs turn out not to be too keen to give him a contract either, he returns home: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yNrjCUQVkeI For reasons so far unknown, a screening of Jews of Egypt was banned by the Egyptian National Security earlier this week. The documentary is a portrait of the lives of the Egyptian Jewish community in the first half of the twentieth century until their second grand exodus after 1956. "An attempt to understand the change in the identity of the Egyptian society that turned from a society full of tolerance and acceptance of one another ... and how it changed gradually by mixing religious and political views into a society that rejects the others," in the words of the film's director Amir Ramses: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cYFwtgeOypQ "Downtown Tribes" is a short documentary created and directed by Amirah Tajdin, and produced by Wafa Tajdin of 8486 Films, commissioned by STR.CRD and shot at their "Urban Street Culture Event" last year (where Dylan and Antoinette also interviewed Just A Band). Loyal AIAC readers will have fun spotting the many familiar faces: http://vimeo.com/58165008 And "A Batalha de Tabatô" ("The Battle of Tabatô") is a first-time feature by director Joao Viana exploring music, magic and, according to The Hollywood Reporter, "post-colonial angst" in Guinea-Bissau. We're still interested though, because that same review remarks Viana's combining "a strong eye and rich subject matter". Here's a first teaser: http://vimeo.com/57537506 And here's another one.

Guest Post by Robert Nathan They're not your average musicians. Sons of West African griots and court musicians brought up in Washington DC and St. Louis, Weedie Braimah and Amadou Kouyate have straddled the Atlantic all their lives. Indoors, they assiduously studied the kora and the djembe under the guidance of their fathers -- master musicians from Senegal and Ghana. But outside people weren't too familiar with the instruments they played, much less the historic institutions to which their families belonged. "I grew up in an African house, true enough," Weedie says. "But at the same time when I walked out of my door, I had a whole different world. I grew up in the Hip-Hop age." That's a paradox they've been living with all their lives.  But it's one to which these uniquely placed artists have reconciled themselves. Masters of their craft -- and just as comfortable on snare and guitar as on calabash and kora -- they're one more example of artists experimenting with a fusion of African and American musical influences. Inheritors of those two traditions, they move between them like there were no boundaries at all. And that, in a way, is what Weedie and Amadou are all about. They're not parroting old djembe rhythms, nor curating a musical museum of African sounds. Above all else, they're creators. And they're letting their creativity run wild. The result is a duo with a captivating show. One minute you're at a Dakar dance party, the next Weedie is hitting the snare so hard you think you're at a Roots concert, and then Amadou lays down a luscious kora riff that unexpectedly turns into a Bill Withers song. They're all over the place -- and it works. See for yourself in this clip recorded before a 700-strong crowd at Victoria's McPherson Playhouse in Canada: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IrMTuvsTQeQ This organic blending of influences is infectious. Weedie and Amadou are masterful with any material, and you catch that vibe when they're on stage. They feel the weight of their African musical lineage, but they also that of the American musical greats who inspire them. "I feel a responsibility to my Kouyaté lineage. But I've got a sense of responsibility to making sure Sam Cooke and Donnie Hathaway are heard, that Coltrane gets heard, too." And they want to be understood in that transcultural context. They aren't a curiosity. They don't want people to dig them because they've never heard a kora before and the experience is novel. They want people to like what they do because they like it, and because of the musicianship they bring to the stage. From their perspective, while they respect the Africa-US musical collaborations that have taken place in recent years between artists like Ry Cooder and Ali Farka Touré, these have tended to be superficial. "It's mostly cosmetic," Amadou says in an interview outside a djembe workshop at the University of Victoria. They have the right to speak that way. After all, if you didn't grow up in an environment where you ate your Corn Flakes and then practiced kora with your master musician father before heading to school with the rest of DC, how could you gain the knowledge required to fuse the African and the American at such a profound level? Weedie and Amadou are proud of their complex musical heritage. And they want African Americans to be proud of a musical tradition that belongs to them too -- one that many in the US don't know much about. But at the end of the day, they're artists with musical sledgehammers, and they're breaking down the borders that exist between 'African music' and music writ large. In this respect they're part of a broader global movement to deparochialize African art, and their work resonates with efforts like the Manifesto for a World Literature in French (a document signed by authors like Alain Mabanckou and Nobel laureate JMG Le Clézio that aims to erase the difference between African literature and literature tout court). Indeed, the day when djembe and kora get the same respect as piano and saxophone is they day they'll rest easy. In a way that day's already here, because they play with jazz greats like Chick Correa who love their style. But there's still plenty of work to be done. So until then, expect Weedie and Amadou to bring their transgressive sound to the world stage by stage, showing everyone what it means to be an African, an American, and an artist who transcends these narrow boundaries. * Robert Nathan is a doctoral candidate in African History at Dalhousie University (Canada). Weedie Braimah and Amadou Kouyate's first album will be out soon.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9t8Z_K8crWo Pretty much all of this week's artist are regular guests on the blog. First up: Pitcho. Remember him. Second, lifted from his 'Jama ko' record, here's a Mali-shot video for Bassekou Kouyate:  http://youtu.be/t2vQAmySTfw There's Anbuley's "pushing African music" even further into the future: http://youtu.be/K2kO6kQPOrk Nuru Kane (born Papa Nouroudine Kane, in Dakar) has got a new record out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xEUd2isYnAg New video for Ian Kamau as well: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vZ8ndbaaZ7w Marques Toliver & The Sometimes in the studio: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=saT7YgnRHaE Zakwe gets help from Danger and Zuluboy on 'Bathi Ngiyachoma': http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vInChgARZYo And Danish duo Okapii sent us through their new video for 'Don't mind the rain', recorded in Barbados: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MqYZLQNHNfo

Let's start with two club tracks. It's Friday after all. Above is a collaboration between Boddhi Satva (from the Central African Republic) and Oumou Sangaré (from Mali) who together recorded this video in Bamako. You could dance to it. And a re-edit of the video for London trio LV's (with help from South African Okmalumkoolkat) 'Boomslang' track:  http://youtu.be/XrMllNS86_Q http://youtu.be/Ws-x_JTaeJA The next video for Fore's 'C'est pas bon' tune blends echoes from Zimbabwe (which Fore calls home), Mali (sample by Amadou and Mariam) and Nigeria (where Andrew Dosunmu is from; the visuals for the video are lifted from Dosunmu's 2011 film Restless City). http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=71jXoHxgE8M Here's German producer Mark Ernestus remixing Malian Ben Zabo (you know we're fans of his work): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zISLtdZGsj4 'Voir sombrer ses fils' is a collaboration between Burkinabé rapper Art Melody (who's dropping a fantastic new record next month; we'll remind you about it when it's out), Joey Le Soldat and DJ Form. Akwaaba has the details. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dcxO6hiylw8 This video was recorded in Port Elizabeth, South Africa and produced in Sweden. Marksmen's EP is following soon. "Port Elizabeth Rap in outer space": http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RHN2GNGZ0uY A new film to watch out for is "La Cité Rose" (here's the trailer; French release is scheduled for next month). The film's soundtrack includes contributions by French artists Soprano, Sexion d'Assaut and Youssoupha. Here's a first out-take: http://youtu.be/JIBJWZb_u1Y Lesotho-based emcees Isosceles and Futuristic join forces as Olive Branch. 'Stat Quo' (video below) is a track off their project by the same name, available here. http://youtu.be/hOqTU8PjCCU A new video for Ghanaian hip-hop artist M.anifest (who you now also know as a football fan): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QZsIgG97abY And finally, here's a record to look forward to: Dan Auerbach (of Black Keys fame) produced Niger-born Bombino's second international solo record (to be released on Nonesuch Records soon). The teaser, to say the least, sounds promising... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zzBpSclwhsM ...if you like guitar sounds, of course. Dan Auerbach is a busy man, it seems, having also produced Valerie June's upcoming record. But more about her in another post.