In the late 1960s, when the Rolling Stones started borrowing from North African music, they probably didn't expect that indigenous bards would someday emerge from the Sahara with their own blend of rock and folk. But that's what the founders of Tinariwen did, and they're real street-fighting men to boot: Ibrahim ag Alhabib and his cohorts are members of the Tuareg (or Tamashek) people and veterans of a decades-long uprising against Mali's government Now the former guerrillas make their case with the sort of loping laments featured on "Aman Iman: Water Is Life," Tinariwen's third album.

The Tuareg (the subject of a fascinating exhibit at the National Museum of African Art through Jan. 27) have long been nomadic, and many of Tinariwen's songs are about the challenges of the wandering life and the frustrations of being forced to abandon it. The music is propelled by hand claps and embroidered by vocal trills, both customary in North African music. But the group abandons lutes for electric guitars and occasionally slips into reggae's distinctive gait The combination is most exhilarating when seemingly ancient melodies are hitched to a small gang of clattering guitars, as during the rollicking yet melancholy "Cler Achel" Even at its gentlest, though, Tinariwen's music is as piercing and powerful as the longing it describes.

Although he often played plugged-in guitar, the late Ali Farka Toure took a more traditional approach to the music sometimes called "Mali blues." On his debut album, Toure's son updates the style, but not radically. Although several tracks on Vieux Farka Toure's self-titled debut are closer to Tinariwen than to his father's work, there are also two duets with Ali and two more with his frequent collaborator, Toumani Diabate. "Ma Hine Cocore," a plea for honorable behavior, is an African folk-rock hybrid with the urgency of youth contrasting the pastoral instrumentals that feature Diabate's rippling kora (a 21-string harp-lute). The spirited "Diallo," however, shows that intensity is not exclusive to the young: Its pulsing lead guitar was played by Ali Farka Toure.

By Mark Jenkins