Previously unheard Ali Farka Touré music uncovered for Voyageur album

The songs on Voyageur were recorded by Ali Farka Touré over a 15 year period and include 3 tracks with Oumou Sangaré.

 

Here's the scoop...

‘Voyageur’, the new album from the legendary African guitarist and singer Ali Farka Touré, will be released by World Circuit Records on 10th March. It is the first release of unheard Touré material since 2010’s posthumous Grammy-winning ‘Ali & Toumani’, and features a collection of gems captured at various points in Ali’s illustrious career. The album, which features fellow Malian superstar Oumou Sangaré on 3 tracks, reaffirms Ali’s status as a globally revered legend of African music. Produced by World Circuit’s Nick Gold with Ali’s son Vieux Farka Touré, ‘Voyageur’ will be available on 180G vinyl, CD and digitally – pre-order it right here. ‘Safari’, the first track to be taken from the album, is available now. Watch the clip below.

No African musician has made an impact at home and on the international imagination like the great Malian guitarist, singer and spiritual father of the Desert Blues, Ali Farka Touré. From Grammy-winning collaborations with Ry Cooder and kora maestro Toumani Diabaté to gritty lo-fi recordings made in his remote home village, Ali’s inimitable voice and hypnotic guitar playing communicates with listeners with an authority that transcends boundaries of markets, fashions and genres. Sixteen years on from his death, Ali remains a towering figure, one of a handful of great talents – alongside Jimi Hendrix and Fela Kuti – whose music feels perennially vital and relevant, whose charisma burns as brightly after their passing as it did in life. 

Ali’s mystique shines on brightly, inspiring listeners around the world and a host of illustrious admirers, including Robert Plant, actor Matthew McConaughey, who based his famous humming chant in the Wolf of Wall Street on one of Ali’s rhythms, and Texas indie-rockers Khruangbin, who recently recorded a collection of Ali’s songs in company with his son Vieux. 

Captured spontaneously over the course of 15 years, on the road and in the studio between sessions for other albums, the songs on ‘Voyageur’ were all of immense personal importance to Ali. They reflect his passionate commitment to the creativity and cultural diversity of his homeland, and a life spent in motion, as a traveller – a Voyageur – between the desert stages of Timbuktu, studios of West Hollywood, the concert halls of London and Tokyo, and tiny villages strung out on the Malian riverside, where Ali was – of course – known by everyone.

From pared back, mesmeric grooves in Ali's signature Sonrhaï style to anthemic fishermen's choruses, pulsing hunters' rhythms and an African “noise band” of reverb-laden guitars and lutes (‘Kombo Galia’), ‘Voyageur’ showcases a secret store of songs which Ali built up through his long and varied career, shedding new light on an extraordinary and enigmatic talent. Check out "Safari" below.