First Listen: Group Inerane, 'Guitars From Agadez, Vol. 3'

September 19, 2010
By Otis Hart

One of my favorite records of the last decade was the first installment in Sublime Frequencies' Guitars From Agadez series, an album by the Tuareg guitar band Group Inerane, which operates out of northern Niger. The trance-like guitar cycles in unusual time signatures sounded like something out of the American avant-garde, which was cool enough on its own, but what really blew my mind was the music's purpose: It was recorded at a wedding party. What could pass for an outdoor concert at New York's Lincoln Center if performed in the U.S. was social lubricant in West Africa. I briefly obsessed over what that said about Western values, but then just decided to enjoy the music.

You may have heard of the Malian Tuareg collective Tinariwen, which is often credited with creating the polyrhythmic guitar music Westerners call "desert blues." To put it in context, if Tinariwen is the equivalent of The Rolling Stones, then Group Inerane is The Velvet Underground. Led by 30-year-old guitarist Bibi Ahmed, the quartet's riffs are raw, while its dual guitarists lose themselves in psychedelic drones.
Unfortunately, Group Inerane's new album, Guitars from Agadez, Vol. 3, serves as a reminder that this beautiful music was born out of political rebellion: Second guitarist Adi Mohammed was shot and killed during the latest round of skirmishes between the Tuareg of the Agadez region and the government of Niger, a conflict rooted in the struggle for a true democracy but deeply linked to the profitable uranium industry which dominates the northern half of this poor nation. In Mohammed's stead is the older Koudede Maman, who represents a link between Tinariwen, which began in the late 1970s, and younger Tuareg guitarists like Ahmed.
Guitars From Agadez, Vol. 3 was recorded earlier this year by Sublime Frequencies' Hisham Mayet in Niger's capital, Niamey. Travel was forbidden to Group Inerane's home in the north by Niger's military junta, which recently ousted dictatorial hopeful Mamadou Tandja and hopes to install an actual democracy by March 2011. If that actually happens, perhaps the music of Ahmed and his peers will finally receive the exposure that it so richly deserves.

Guitars From Agadez, Vol. 3 will stream here in its entirety until Sept. 28. Please leave your thoughts on the album in the comments section below.



First Listen: Group Inerane, 'Guitars From Agadez, Vol. 3'
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