Terakaft in what is actually a radio studio concert, recorded on April 4, 2013 in the performance auditorium of Radio France FIP.
Terakaft is a Tishoumaren (Desert Blues) band from Mali, formed in 2001 by formed by former members of the Tinariwen band. Founding members included guitarist Kedou Ag Ossad and bassist Liya Ag Ablil. Like Tinariwen, Terakaft’s music is deeply rooted in the struggles and experiences of the Tuareg people, who have long faced political and cultural marginalization in Mali and other parts of the Saharan region. The band’s name, Terakaft, means “caravan” in the Tamasheq language, and reflects the nomadic roots of the Tuareg people. Terakaft has released several albums, including “Bismilla: The Bko Sessions” in 2010, “Aratan N Azawad” in 2011, and “Alone” in 2015. The band has also toured extensively around the world, earning a reputation as one of the most exciting and innovative bands in the desert blues genre.
I ran across this excellent 2015 article by D’Arcy Doran from Huck, which explains a lot of what Terafraft are all about – makes for a fascinating read – here’s a snippet:
After al-Qaida-backed Tuareg Islamists took control of two thirds of Mali early in 2014, the French army intervened in Mali in January pushing them back. Terakaft and Tinariwen are glad to see the Islamists gone. The bands are secular: They like drinking, girls and playing what the Islamists call ‘Satan’s music’.
But French intervention hasn’t brought peace to the region. Malian troops clashed with Tuareg fighters in the beginning of June. The fighting has displaced more than 500,000 people in one of the southern Sahara’s biggest humanitarian crises ever.
On the road, the musicians call home frequently, but they can’t tell whether things are settling down. “We don’t know,” Pino says, speaking French. “There are still problems. People were overrun by terrorists and bandits so they had to evacuate. Most people are in exile in Niger, Algeria and Burkina.” He explains that people are trying to find ways to feed their families and many are waiting in refugee camps.
The absence of Terakaft’s leader is another reminder of the difficulties back home. The missing link is Sanou’s uncle, Liya Ag Ablil – aka Diara – one of the original members of Tinariwen, the Grammy award-winning group who first brought Tuareg music to the fore. In April, Diara was travelling home to see his family and disappeared. Then ten days before the London show, he called from a jail in northern Mali, the band’s manager Philippe Brix explains.
Diara explained how, having flown into Algeria, he was arrested amid a relay of motorcycles and ramshackle buses as he crossed the desert into Mali. With fear of foreign terrorists high, his passport aroused suspicion — it had stamps from all over the world, but no entry stamp and he had an ‘unusual’ amount of cash. Brix, who also managed Tinariwen in the past, called nearly everyone he knew, until a Malian diplomat helped free Diara.
The sand men might travel far, but they never leave the desert behind. Their hypnotic, looping, bluesy electric guitar music is the ultimate adventure soundtrack – and it plays on the headphones of some of the world’s leading musicians. Henry Rollins is a constant champion of Tinariwen, they inspired Radiohead’s Thom Yorke to write ‘The Clock’, Flea from the Red Hot Chili Peppers has joined them onstage and members of TV on the Radio went to the Sahara to record with them. They’ve opened for the Rolling Stones and Robert Plant called discovering Tinariwen an epiphany: “I felt this was the music I’d been looking for all my life.”
Their lyrics are all in Tamashek and most members cannot speak French or English. The language barrier means both Terakaft and Tinariwen rely on mystery to draw people in.
The Tuareg dream of independence may have turned into a nightmare, but Terakaft are determined to distill that story into music that resonates far beyond their home. “Our songwriting is the result of events,” Sanou says in Tamashek with Pino translating, “events that have happened. So we write about the terrorism, we write about the geopolitics of the Sahara, we write about the people’s exile, we write about the people’s beauty, we write about the people’s freedom.”
Head over to Huck’s website and read the whole article.
Big thanks to D’Arcy Doran for putting all the words and the vibe down.
All you have to do is dive in, listen and let Terakaft do the rest.
