Imagine Chuck Berry as a Hare Krishna, or Bo Diddley in an Ethiopian soul band, and you will get an idea of what Tinariwen sounds like. When these Toureg rebels traded their rifles for electric guitars, a musical revolution happened in the Saharan desert. On Wednesday night, they turned On the Boards into a psychedelic blues palace with a sound that could be described as The Incredible String Band meets the Grateful Dead.

Tinariwen mixed several styles into the show, with most of the music loosely based on traditional Toureg music conventionally played on the flute.