 Baaba Maal Extremely safe "world music" from Senegal's Baaba Maal, Nomad Soul will appeal mainly to those who don't like to stray very far from Peter Gabriel's RealWorld label and or their local Starbucks. It certainly looks like it's going to be a great album, with its cool black-and-white album cover photos and sleek lettering, but ultimately this is pretty much just barista music minus the coffee and attitude. I'm one of those weird purists who have no reason to be purist except for some vague notion of "wanting the real deal." I certainly know next to nothing about music from Senegal, or Africa in general, except that I like a lot of it. Most of the African music I listen to is from Fela Kuti and Hamza El-Din – totally different musical worlds, and Baaba Maal presents another. He's a huge star in Senegal, and probably one of the big crossover stars of the "world music" segment of the American music industry. He's got a great voice, and the songs are suitably groovin'. But to me, it all sounds way too overproduced and westernized – the first track features English-language female vocals singing "I Will Follow You," throwing it into a very slick fusion of Afropop and, say, Sarah McLachlan. Most of the tracks are more straightforward, but everything is very pop-oriented, very 1998, and simply not all that interesting. I mean, call me reactionary, but I like my Senegalese music to not feature drum and keyboard programming. The disc moves along pleasantly, and as background music it's decent enough. Listening closely reveals it to be a pretty limp studio effort until the last two songs, "Koni" and "Lam Lam," which find Baaba Maal in what sounds like a much more natural environment – away from all the ragga and techno rhythms and among acoustic guitars and a bed of vocal harmonies. "Lam Lam" features Jon Hassell on trumpet, and Brian Eno in the producer's chair – but I'm the last person that will tell you that's anything more than slightly interesting. Brian Eno doesn't automatically make something good, you know. Even so, it's a good track with a lot of texture and a slowly developing mood – quite ambitious, and the album could have used more of that. Maal is a great artist, but he's fairly well buried on Nomad Soul. This album sticks to your ribs about as much as a bag of Wow! Doritos.
Review by Jonas Fucque-Witt |