Saturday, September 18, 2010

Another Rockin' One-Off




Roaring out of Kinshasa by way of Paris with drum machine in tow, it's Rigo Star and Josky Kiambukuta with Jotongo (Mayala MA4005, 1986), a platter that can best be described as "soukous rock."

Josky Kiambukuta is the honey-voiced vocalist who joined Franco's legendary TPOK Jazz in 1973 and composed many of its greatest songs. Rigo Star made his mark in Papa Wemba's Viva la Musica before decamping to Paris and recording with the likes of Sam Mangwana and Kanda Bongo Man, later becoming a much-sought arranger and producer. Like Uhuru Aiye by Bob Ohiri and his Uhuru Sounds, posted in this space earlier, Jotongo is an apparent one-time studio collaboration that was never repeated. Similarly, its somewhat deracinated sound has a "hard rock" edge that sets it apart from some of the more mainstream sounds of the day. As no other musicians are credited on the sleeve, I suspect all of the musical contributions were provided by Kiambukuta and Star via overdubbing.






Download Jotongo as a zipped file here.

5 comments:

Kostas from Greece said...

Thank you for this rare -rock-album...
All the best!!!

Anonymous said...

thank you
sinceley

wuod k

Kisondella, A.A said...

I like Josky Kiambukuta, GOD keep him alive, as most TP OK Jazz guys have lost

cisbio said...

Blimey! this is the first LP you've posted that I actually own.

Downloaded nonetheless. ta

Apurva Bahadur said...

Fantastic! Many thanks for sharing. Apurva from Pune, India.