Farsang Interviews: Analog Dakar
FARSANG spoke with Renaud Lioult, one of the founders of the Senegal-based collective, which revives the transatlantic grooves of postcolonial West and Central Africa.
How did Analog Dakar start? You call yourselves a collective, how does this work?
Yann and I met 2 years ago in Dakar, Senegal, and we discovered that we had a common passion: African records. We started to throw parties every two months, in historic venues around the capital. We invited a few Dakar vinyl deejays and diggers to play with us: Mr Magic (Lamine Kandji), Shakara Man (Cheikh Amala Doucouré) and Tangal Beatz (who also plays tapes). And like that, we became a collective. We share the tasks. Yann and I are in charge of the AR/PR, social media accounts and feeds and design. Dingri manages the logistics and decoration, while Amala and Lamine find the records ... but we are all behind the decks.
We try to invite International guests to play with us as regularly as we can, to share in this love of African analogue music. Our guests so far have included Selector Chico (Uruguay), Florence Mambo Chick (France), Rainer Windic (Switzerland), Doudou Sarr (Senegal) and Coco Maria (Mexico). We plan to invite others guests as soon as the pandemic is over.
What drew you to post-independence West and Central African music in the first place?
No one plays the music we love at parties, so we decided to do it ourselves. It's a shame when, in a country with such a rich musical heritage, almost no one plays this music any more. To my knowledge, we are the only ones in West Africa. Beyond that, there’s a certain pleasure to sharing the hidden treasures of African music and helping people to rediscover these treasures, in the face of what we perceive as a botched standardization. It is also a struggle of sorts against actual uniformity, by offering our audience the opportunity to discover the diversity of African musical heritage.
You mention that you are ‘vinyl only’, and are obviously called ‘analog’ dakar - what convinced you to focus on this particular medium?
We started digging for records years ago (more than 20 years for some of us) and organized vinyl-only parties before that. We love this format, for its size, sound quality and beautiful cover art. Vinyl also has that DIY touch sometimes and with it come all the stories behind the music, the historical perspectives above all. We also liked the idea of coming together around a common passion, like a club... Analog Dakar Club sounded as a natural choice for us, very explicit.
What are the main things that you think about when curating and creating a mix (for al-Hara radio for example)?
We like to think of our mixes as a journey, where we can guide the listener to unknown territories, to meet different styles or less well-known artists. It can be through a genre, or a region. For example, sometimes it’s a journey from West to Central Africa and back again, or it can be musical and melodic associations, with subjective choices. We try as much as possible to play music from similar eras, for technical reasons (mastering/recording/sound quality) but also for an effective contextualization. In the future themes, we would like to explore the themes that regularly come up in the music: money, love, betrayal, struggle ...
Do you think musical traditions from West and Central Africa naturally fuse well with genres from across the Atlantic ? Why?
We often play South American or Caribbean music, as their African roots are obvious: sometimes the rhythms are the same! Even the lyrics have sometimes remained. For example the title "Che Che Cole", popularized by Willie Colon and Hector Lavoe in 69, is a traditional Western African child song that crossed the Atlantic in the holds of slave ships. We also play a lot of Caribbean music, such as Biguines, Compas, Kadence and Zouk, the sort of which is immensely popular here in Africa. Another point of note is the influence of Zairean music on the “picos” (vinyl sound system) of Colombia. To add to these pre-existing links, we have a large number of South American followers on our social networks. They are great diggers.
How has your experience with Radio al-Hara been? Where do you see the future of online radio stations (often radical in ethos) going?
We had a friend in common, Coco Maria. She introduced us to them. We like the idea of having a regular radio show where we can play whatever we want. They are lovely people and their cause is just. In addition, being broadcast in this part of the world particularly pleases us, as it opens us up to other audiences. Online radios are great because of their uncommercial policy, and the free space they offer. This allows one to explore and share without limits. The immediate feedback on each mix is great, too. We think that creating quality content is the future, whatever the format is. We see the podcasts also as a great opportunity to contextualize and explain our mixes, and the history behind the LP we choose to focus on.
Which artist out of those that Analog Dakar have showcased online (on your mixes, on instagram, on soundcloud) do you wish more people would listen to? Do you have any personal favourites?
This is a huge question! We are constantly discovering forgotten artists. One is Marc Nkodo David, a self-produced singer from Cameroon with a crazy funky bikutsi vibe. Another is Fonseca et ses Anges Noirs, a Senegalese percussionist and singer of Cape Verdean origins, who was really famous in Europe during the 60’s and 70’s for his Afro-Latin West Indian style. He managed a club in Brussels called L'Ange Noir. Then there is Oliver De Coques, a Nigerian guitar hero who popularised the "Ogene" dance and advanced high life music. He’s really underrated - you have to listen to all of his LP’s with his band Expo 76. We are also fond of Ifang Bondi from Gambia and his raw psych/folk/mbalax style, which is truly unique. To conclude this non-exhaustive list, one of my personal favourites is Armando Pires from Cape Verde, a fantastic guitarist, who contributed to many major albums of the 70s and 80s, and has sadly fallen into oblivion.
In West Africa (Senegal in particular), is there still a wide interest in the ‘grooves and rarities’ of the late 20th century?
By starting this musical adventure we thought we would attract mature people, but in reality our audience is mainly made up of young people, Senegalese or expatriates who are either connoisseurs or music lovers, but above all dancers who want a different vibe. Afterwards don't kid us, our audience is rare, and our music has a niche, but it always arouses interest and curiosity. People love to take pictures of the covers. Some try to shazam it but most of the time it doesn't work!
How did you go about finding these records?
The majority of stocks of african vinyls have been scoured by diggers for twenty years but there are still great discoveries, especially among individuals and music lovers. Word of mouth is the best digger. When we started 20 years ago it was easy and cheap. Now the prices are up, the records are in bad shape and the dealers know the prices. They have Discogs too!
As Dakar residents, we have our own supply chain and we know all the local diggers. That way we still make nice surprises and discoveries.