Meanwhile, I have been walking around town trying to whistle "Gana el Hawa" (an Abdel Halim Hafez song he covers here). A good song to cover. It seems like kind of an obvious choice, but I haven't actually heard many covers of it. (I do wish he had ditched the choral accompaniment on the two Egyptian songs, but oh well, it's certainly true the sensibility of the originals to keep it. It's just a typical aspect of Arabic music which I atypically dislike.)
― arthritic hand golden fist (RSLaRue), Saturday, 16 December 2006 01:03 (seventeen years ago) link
I love Agatha -- I happen to be listening to it now. But, really, the whole album is fun. Do you know much about the songs?
― Vornado (Vornado), Monday, 18 December 2006 21:54 (seventeen years ago) link
I am familiar with the two Egyptian songs ("Gana el Hawa," a song originally sing by Abdel Halim Hafez, which is by the same Egyptian composer Jay-Z took that "Big Pimpin'" riff from, and "Ganeli Sheway Sheway," a song from an Oum Kalthoum move from the 40s). I am a lot less familiar with Algerian music than Egyptian music, but I've been picking up bits and pieces about the other songs from reviews and interviews with Rachid Taha. Also, I like Rachid Taha's own couple songs on here.
I have not been a Rachid Taha fan, but I am very impressed with what he, and everyone involved, have done on this. It maintains a lot of the actual flavors of North Africa and Egypt in the timbres and the rhythms. (On the other hand, I keep coming across reviewers who describe the whole thing as rai, which is either partly or entirely wrong. I think the North African styles are chabai or other forerunners of rai.)
If you don't have a legit. copy, the actual CD is worth having for the lyrics.
― arthritic hand golden fist (RSLaRue), Monday, 18 December 2006 23:35 (seventeen years ago) link
― Alex in SF (Alex in SF), Monday, 18 December 2006 23:39 (seventeen years ago) link
― arthritic hand golden fist (RSLaRue), Monday, 18 December 2006 23:43 (seventeen years ago) link
― arthritic hand golden fist (RSLaRue), Monday, 18 December 2006 23:53 (seventeen years ago) link
If you can, get the real, French 2-disk version, not the 1-disk abridgement that gets sold here as [i]Khaled Taha Faudel[/i]. That's not bad, but it drops some of the old rai songs, and it doesn't have enough Faudel on it (his voice is amazing).
But I also agree that [i]Diwan 2[/i] is definitely worth a purchase. It is really well-recorded -- great textures, great instrumentation (although not especially rai instrumentation -- no accordion), great feel. Taha's last record was very rock and very explicitly political. This one is much lighter, and more subtle -- a long celebration of hybrid francarabe culture, which presents embracing your confusion and syncretism as an implied alternative to Islamism and Salafist rigor.
In the pop rai vein, I liked Cheb Mami's [i]Delalli[/i] and any of the recent Khaled records.
― Vornado (Vornado), Tuesday, 19 December 2006 14:59 (seventeen years ago) link
― tiit (t**t), Tuesday, 19 December 2006 16:01 (seventeen years ago) link
If you like Taha in general, I can't imagine your not liking this. It's very much of a piece with his work, though it has a radically different emphasis than Tekitoi? or any of the last few records.
― Vornado (Vornado), Tuesday, 19 December 2006 20:18 (seventeen years ago) link
― tiit (t**t), Tuesday, 19 December 2006 21:11 (seventeen years ago) link