Kwi Bamba & L'Orchestre De Gama Berema
Kwi Bamba & L'Orchestre De Gama Berema

Folksongs and Ballads by Tia Blake & Her Folk Group, is more than just a “lost classic”.As clear and honest as can be, Folksongs and Ballads is a magnetic record, a refuge like onlyNick Drake, Nico, and a few others have been able to create.A graceful, delicately minimalist approach to classic Appalachian and British folk songs.Originally released only in France in 1971, Ici Bientôt is very pleased to present the first ever reissue on vinyl.When she recorded her only album, Tia Blake was nineteen years old and had just arrived in Paris a year and a half beforehand. She spent most of her time at Disco’Thé, a record shop in the Latin Quarter, a free space, peaceful and inspiring, a hub for students as well as the local artistic community.There, Tia Blake would occasionally sing—when she managed to overcome her shyness. Two young guitarists who were passionate fans of folk music and regulars at the shop began to accompany her, forming “Her Folk Group.”One year later, they cut 11 tracks at Pierre Barouh’s Studios Saravah.Folksongs and Ballads is composed of traditional tunes that have been covered many times, but they’re not the best known folk standards.A collection of stories ranging from the Middle Ages to the 1960s, bringing together sublimely doleful ballads, lamentations for a lost lover, and an unexpected, brilliant version of the road anthem “Plastic Jesus.”Tia Blake's haunting, unaffected voice captivates and comforts us, wrapping us in its cool embrace. Meanwhile, the tasteful, stripped-down, mellow acoustic arrangements provided by the guitarists, reminiscent of Bert Jansch and John Renbourn, occasionally supported by a kena flute, have created the space Tia Blake needed to reinvent these traditional songs.Folksongs and Ballads is a timeless record, deep and unique, a longtime companion for repeated listening, in the vein of works by Sibylle Baier, Bridget St. John and Vashti Bunyan.In loving memory of Tia Blake (1952-2015)

Essiebons Special, publié par Analog Africa, présente une sélection de travaux obscurs de quelques-uns des plus grands noms du label. Au cours de la numérisation de ses vastes archives de bandes originales, Essilfie-Bondzie a trouvé un certain nombre de chefs-d’œuvre afrobeat et instrumentaux de l’âge d’or du label au milieu des années 70 qui, pour une raison ou une autre, n’avaient jamais été publiés. Ces chansons sont incluses ici pour la première fois.Malheureusement, Essilfie-Bondzie est décédé avant que la compilation ne soit terminée. Mais son héritage survit dans la musique extraordinaire qu’il a offerte au monde de son vivant. Pendant une grande partie des années 1970, les labels Dix et Essiebons de Dick Essilfie-Bondzie ont été à la pointe du highlife moderne, et sa liste d’artiste était composée de légendes locales absolues. C.K. Mann, Gyedu-Blay Ambolley, Kofi Papa Yankson, Ernest Honny, Rob « Roy » Raindorf et Ebo Taylor ont tous sorti certains de leurs meilleurs titres sous la bannière d’Essiebons.Dick Essilfie-Bondzie was all ready for his 90th birthday party when the Covid pandemic hit. The legendary producer, businessman and founder of Ghana’s mighty Essiebons label had invited all his family and friends to the event and it was the disappointment at having to postpone that prompted Analog Africa founder Samy Ben Redjeb to propose a new compilation celebrating his contributions to the world of West African music.For most of the 1970s Essilfie-Bondzie’s Dix and Essiebons labels were synonymous with the best in modern highlife, and his roster was a who’s-who of highlife legends. C.K. Mann, Gyedu Blay Ambolley, Kofi Papa Yankson, Ernest Honny, Rob ‘Roy’ Raindorf and Ebo Taylor all released some of their greatest music under the Essiebons banner.Yet Essilfie-Bondzie had been destined for a very different career. Born in Apam and raised in Accra, he was sent to business school in London at the age of 20, and returned to the security of a government job in Ghana. But his passion for music, inspired by the sounds of Accra’s highlife scene, had never left him, and in 1967 he figured out a way of combining music and business by opening West Africa’s first record pressing plant.The venture, a partnership with the Philips label, was a huge success, attracting business from all over the continent. By the early 1970s Essilfie-Bondzie had left his government job to concentrate on his labels, and by the mid-seventies he was on a hot streak injecting album after album of restless highlife into the bloodstream of the Ghanaian music scene.Essiebons Special features a selection of obscure workouts from some of the label’s heaviest hitters. But in the course of digitising his vast archive of master tapes, Essilfie-Bondzie found a number of Afrobeat and Instrumental maszterpieces tracks from the label’s mid-70s golden age that, for one reason or another, had never been released. Those songs are included here for the first time.Sadly Essilfie-Bondzie passed away before the compilation was finished. But his legacy lives on in the extraordinary music that he gave to the world in his lifetime.

Pink Vinyl ! A redefinition of Americana.