New Music From Tinariwen – Digital Servicing Only

Road movies often unfold the same way, with characters traveling in search of truth while reconnecting with a past that has – of course – been erased. Tinariwen’s Elwan has a similar story, coming from a band that has been triumphantly touring the world at the same time as the frontiers that encircle their desert home have been closing and forcing them into exile. In recent years, Tinariwen’s homeland, a Saharan mountain range between north-eastern Mali and southern Algeria, has been transformed into a conflict zone. While the songs on the new record evoke those cherished deserts of home, they were recorded far away in two distinctive bursts – first at Rancho de la Luna studios in California’s Joshua Tree desert, with sessions engineered by Andrew Schepps (Johnny Cash, Jay-Z) and including guests like Kurt Vile, Matt Sweeny (Bonnie “Prince” Billy, Cat Power), and Mark Lanegan (Queens of the Stone Age), and then later in a Southern Moroccan oasis accompanied by the local musical youth and a group of Berber ‘gnawa’ trance musicians. The results are musically powerful and poignant: every song evokes a land that can no longer be found.

In advance of the album’s February 10 release, Tinariwen has shared singles “Ténéré Tàqqàl” and “Sastanàqqàm,” two hypnotically groovy and percussive songs, propelled by stunning group vocals and swirling guitar riffs. The band will embark on a US tour with Dengue Fever starting in April.

“A groundbreaking Tuareg music collective” –NPR Music

“Like everything the group does, ‘Ténéré Tàqqàl’ sways and pulls at the heartstrings, pure expression through both music and lyrics. As always, no melancholy is more sincere and no tale more elegantly told than Tinariwen’s.” –PopMatters

RIYL: Bombino, Ali Farka Toure, Group Doueh, Goat, Amadou & Mariam

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