Danama

Description

"Trustworthy." That's the meaning of "danama," this Bambara word from Mali. Self-confidence, confidence in others, in one's word, in desirable futures. To advocate optimism, a drive towards the future, the strength of the collective, the wise magic of cross-culturalism... in these troubled times of interminable wars, nationalist retrenchments, or abundant natural disasters, encouraged by predatory capitalism? Then we need tons of confidence. Sustained by the passion, composure, and stratagems of these afro-groove scientists, who do not ignore their sorrows or the scandals of History. This is the athletic art of Arat Kilo, which undoubtedly remains the best Ethio-jazz orchestra in France, on the path of this fifth album recorded in spring 2024. Confidence was also needed to change the way they worked. For all previous albums, the band gathered in the studio to play each song together, complete in the same room, with the romantic idea of a warm, lively, organic performance, in the manner of the great Ethiopian masters of the 60s-70s. For Danama, the music was first collected by tandem: guitar/bass, drums/percussion, saxophone/trumpet, and the two voices. Adding a few new instruments: dark synthesizers, a bass clarinet, a tiny guitalele (similar to a ukulele) or a Malian n'goni (sometimes defined as "the griots' lute"). Then, and most importantly, it was about experimenting with genuine sound production work, with the help of sound design, multi-track exploration, and effects applied to the textures collected over eight days at Gong studios in Montreuil and OneTwoPassIt in Bagnolet. Thus, the group's natural taste for genre fusion, children of Radio Nova's "Grand Mix," was able to fully assert itself. By borrowing from the frenetic rhythms of Newark's jersey club, English 2-step, or New Orleans brass bands, grafted onto Arat Kilo's musical base: the tezeta, that famous minor pentatonic scale typical of Ethiopian jazz, melancholic as can be. Enough to weave layers of sounds, collages of emotions, like the album cover, created by artist Clément Laurentin from multi-colored fragments of posters torn from the street. The result is this luminous journey on the Danama channel. Eleven songs and one instrumental, all mixed by Mathieu "Gib" Gibert – a pillar of La Fine Équipe's beatmakers – to excite crowds and relearn to stick together.