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Concert Preview
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Chicago Reader, Concert Preview >>
So your ancestors were nomads who drove camel caravans across the Sahara, but modern nations chopped up their routes with borders and now you're stuck in a refugee camp in Libya. What else can you do but start a band? Many of the Kel Tamashek (widely known as Tuaregs) took up arms in such camps, hoping to reclaim by force what they'd lost by opting out of Africa's colonial and postcolonial governments, but the members of Tinariwen picked up electric guitars too. They've been playing together since the 80s, when their revolutionary songs were banned in Algeria and Mali, but they didn't release an album outside North Africa until The Radio Tisdas Sessions in 2001. Both on that record and its successor, 2004's Amassakoul (World Village), the politics are more personal, animated by a determination to persevere in the face of civil war, drought, and cultural decline. Using anywhere from two to four guitars, an electric bass, and a collection of hand percussion, Tinariwen suspends call-and-response singing over braided, droning leads and clip-clopping grooves that get more hypnotic the deeper the band gets into its set. 04/14/06 >> go there
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