Thursday, August 08, 2013

Hollywood Babel On: Diaspora Blues

Days like today are what you live for if you’re a fan of world music and/or a reluctant Angeleno, hoping to justify your existence, or at least the higher rents of LA, vis a vis the Golden Triangle (that’s northern Thailand I’m talking about, not the greater Beaumont area).  How often, on some random Thursday, do you get your choice of the Sierra Leone Refugee All-Stars, Bombino, or the Garifuna Collective?  And this isn’t even the weekend ferchrissakes!  And they’re all for free, unless you count parking fees.  That may apply most seriously to the Sierra Leone guys, who’re playing out at the Skirball, difficult of access by public trans.  Only problem there is the security check, reminiscent of the El Al counter in Munich.  Better eat those brownies first, just to be safe.  If you don’t know, they’re war refugees from Sierra Leone—Britain’s equivalent of Liberia—who chose to make the best of a bad situation, and who, over the last decade, have produced some of the world’s best music.
                    
Bombino is playing second bill to Hanni El-Khatib out at the Santa Monica Pier, which should pose no security or other problems.  He’s a Tuareg musician from Niger, unlike most of the popular Tuareg groups, who are from Mali/Azawad/whatever.  It forms an interesting contrast, too, for a tribal group that historically has never recognized boundaries, bolstering my opinion that many of the Mali groups are simply Tinariwen knock-offs.  Whatever the truth of that hypothesis, Bombino is certainly not simply that.  His performance this morning on KCRW was ample proof of that.  Interestingly, he communicated to the English-speaking audience, not through his second language of French, but through his third language of Hausa, a Hamitic language, thanks to Rocky Dawuni of Ghana.  I love it.  That’s the strangest mash-up since my own chats with Kampuchean Ch’hom Nimol in Thai.  Yes, that really happened.

Speaking of linguistic mash-ups: last but not least, there’s the Garifuna Collective in MacArthur Park’s Levitt Pavilion.  For the uninitiated, Garifuna aka ‘Black Caribs’ are mixed Afro-Amerindians expelled by the British (and hand-picked for their blackness) from the Lesser Antilles, and left to fend for themselves in Central America.  That they did, speaking an Arawakan language with significant Carib loanwords, and looking as African as our collective history.  Once there, some have even mingled traditions with resident Kekchi Mayas.  I witnessed it myself.  Many others have become kick-ass musicians, led by the example of Andy Palacio, r.i.p.  These guys—and gals—are good, too. Decisions, decisions…


A few years ago I’d’ve been trying to figure out a way to see them all, but… I’m younger than that now, living in the moment, too cool for school, yeah right.  I once went to as many as five different shows and venues in one evening, separated by at least ten miles.  Now the best I can do is sneak away from Grand Performances downtown and mosey on over to Pershing Square to see how yesterday’s one-hit wonders are faring today.  I did that last week when Palenke Soultribe got too heavy for me; Smithereens still rock btw.  The Tubes will be there this Sat, might slip away from the Water Court after El Gusto finishes up.  Mia Doi Todd is at Levitt Pasadena tomorrow Friday.  She’s way underrated, and highly recommended for anyone who likes taut lyrics with breezy melodies.  Chicano Batman is there Saturday.  I love LA.

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