Venue:
St. Georges, Bristol
Date: 06/09/2023
In Dakar last night, the temperature was slowly falling after a steamy day to a low of about 26 degrees overnight.
At St. Georges, in the middle of Bristol, the same evening started at a sultry 27 degrees, still holding by about 7:45 pm. But then, over the following nearly two hours, it shot up to what I estimated to be at least a sweltering 35 degrees. My T-shirt was soaked. Despite this thermogeddon, like everyone else around me, I found myself dancing, lost in the flowing, sinuous magic that enveloped me from the stage.
Hot? Sweaty? Legs aching? Sure. Absolutely bloody wonderful, joyous and life-affirming. After two months of feeling diminished and depleted by an unexpected illness, miraculously I finally felt ALIVE again. I couldn’t stop grinning. It made me so happy I nearly cried.
The source of all this personal and collective joy was a nine-piece band I’ve been keen to see play live since the day I bought ‘Great Moments In Vinyl History’, and then the mighty compilation known as ‘Pirates Choice’. The band was Orchestra Baobab, and like the rest of the grinning, dancing, clapping, smiling capacity crowd, I was delighted to find that they damn well delivered.
Almost two hours of this endlessly celebratory music flashed past in what seemed like half an hour of happy madness. A couple of times, audience members were invited on stage to dance with the band, most notably a young girl who got a huge ovation for showing all the codgers in the house (your scribe included) what the art of dancing looks like when you’re barely in your teens and still have the bottomless pit of energy that most of us can only remember with envy. A totally brilliant moment.
Take my advice if you can, grab a ticket and see this lot, it’s like a shot in the arm for anyone living in what currently often seems like a lifeless, forelorn little country run by the clueless – this is graceful, mellifluous, irresistible music melded from the west of Africa and the Caribbean, delivered with charm, verve and unassailable musical chops. Baby, if you ain’t dancin’ to these guys, you must be dead.
Remaining tour dates – one in Glasgow, two nights in London – see the link in the comments. Go!
The audience:
The St. Georges standard Brizzle luvvie mob, with additional Afterworder types, the odd dreadlocked hippy, and a fair smattering of African fans who had been lucky to find themselves close enough to town to make it to the gig.
It made me think..
What jabs will I need to have had to get to Dakar one day to experience the local scene for myself.
Remaining tour dates: https://www.songkick.com/artists/5364-orchestra-baobab
Here’s where it started for me, many years ago in 1988:
And well done, Kershaw Kid, for using the correct form, ‘boxed set’ rather than the ghastly, lazy portmanteau form.
The taster track, and the earworm that drew me in.
If this doesn’t delight you, I’d consult an trick cyclist.
Splendid band saw them over twenty years ago in Newcastle but I’ve been unlucky to be away when they played near me last year.
Joyous music.
A bucket list band for me Foxy. Still waiting.
Trekking through Africa in 1983 Dakar was on the list but I succumbed to sickness and never gotto the mighty Star Club 😔
Lovely revue, Foxy – colour me officially green with envy.
I find OB soothe my soul in ways it’s not possible to put into words.
I do hope I get the chance to catch them at some point, but sadly it won’t be on this visit.
In the meantime, please enjoy what I think is my personal favourite track of theirs
A magnificent band. This was my point of entry, on a two-fer released by the fine Sterns label. The guitar and vocals here are sublime.
@kaisfatdad posted some great pics of him and his daughter grooving to them at a recent open air gig in Sweden on his FB.
I did indeed, @Gatz. Glad you liked the photos.
What a wonderfully joyous evening that was!
A glorious summer evening. A large, enthusiastic audience of all ages (lots of young people). A band who really made contact with the audience and got us all dancing. And, as it was part of the annual Culture Festival, it was all completely free of charge.
A friend saw them at the Stockholm Konserthus a few months. I am sure they were excellent, but in the open air with room to move about, I am sure they were even better.
Now, when my daughter goes to her weekly dance class, the teacher plays Utrus Horas to establish the mood. What a magnificent piece of music it is.
I was really looking forward to the gigs at the Culture Festival this year, and this one especially, but no – I had to postpone my vacation this year because we didn’t have enough people that could work in August…so I missed the entire festival!
Since I work late nights I wasn’t able to go to the gigs on work days either.
The only positive is that because I basically had to sacrifice all of the weeks I originally wanted free, I got my boss to promise that I get to choose first next summer…
Still doesn’t quite make up for missing so many great artists this year. I’m officially envious!
Also – the annual Book Table “lost their sponsor and couldn’t get a new one in time”, so had to cancel! WTF? How much sponsorship do they need for an event like that??
I’m very sorry to hear you missed all the festival @Locust. Your boss really needs to plan the staffing a little better!
If they don’t pull their socks up and give you time to go to gigs, @DuCo01 and I will boycott your store. As you know, we are both high profile influencers, so this would be disastrous for them.
Baobab started at 17.00 which was ridiculously early but suited us rather well.
Gosh! Someone filmed a little at the gig.
And this guy has filmed half the concert.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dM8qITfongs
How wonderful. I am seriously jealous. I adore the Baobab.
I saw them mid-afternoon at the Cambridge Folk Fest about 15 years ago. It is the only time I’ve seen the whole place standing.
Really? You shoulda caught Arrested Development this year. Or Ibibio Sound Machine, who you had hoped to make.)
I haven’t been to the last 10 ish.
Seriously jealous. Love that band and would have gladly travelled to Bristol to see them.
We’ ve already mentioned Orchestra Baobab’s wonderful “theme tune” Utrus Horas. It was one of the highspots of their set on Friday evening in Stockholm and the first few notes received an enomous round of applause.
It’s a song I’ve loved for a long time, but hearing Baobab sing it live made realise I had no idea
what they are actually singing about.
A quick google revealed that the lyrics are a mixture of Wolof and Creole and that the song is based on a lovely tune from Guinea Bissau by José Carlos Schwarz: Lua Kata Kema. (The Moon is Ours).
“Sometimes I want to follow the sun, but the sun does not know me.
Make no mistake, the moon is ours.
We get close to the moon and the moon does not burn us.
The moon is ours, the moon is ours.”
Schwarz was an interesting figure. Something of a Che Guevara-like figure in his native Guinea Bissau, he was famed as a poet and songwriter. He died in a plane crash in Cuba in 1977, only 27 years old.
Top research @kaisfatdad – I’ve always wondered about the lyric myself, but was afraid to investigate, in case it turned out to be ‘I really love your tiger feet’.
😲
I know what you mean, Vulpes. I saw the sublime Cesaria Evora with a Portuguese speaker. He enjoyed the show but commented that the song lyrics were all rather “moon in June” .
I confess, I was a little nervous about seeing Baobab because they have lost several of their most important members in recent years.
Not least Barthelemy Attiso- The Gibson Lawyer – whose beautiful guitar playing was such an important of their sound.
My worries were unfounded. The new members preserve the spirit of the band excellently
Cesaria Evora could sing Mud’s Greatest Hits and it would still be sublime.
As for the young chap standing in Barthelemy’s shoes; he looks like a Senegalese Lowell George and plays just as beautifully. He played the first bar of Utrus and there was a deep murmer of recognition from the audience. I just thought, ‘Oh, YESSSSS’ and wallowed in it.
I agree, he did a very fine job. As they all did. They took their time and didn’t over-do things in trying to win the audience over. They just played superbly and it was impossible to resist. Historically the band had been through quite a few changes over the years. https://youtu.be/WCeCAuXCmHU?si=dI119ao9usT9p9qX
Too many bands try too hard with the crowd engagement. Play superbly and win em over. Simples.
I feckin’ love the Boabab, wonderful, wonderful band, vibes, tunes, players.
There is a saying, “he who cannot groove to the Boabab is a feckin’ tory”
Pirate’s Choice must be the most played album ever, in this house.
And hey! let’s hear it for “Specialist in all Styles”, too. Cracking album.
Both present and correct chez chat.
I wanted to know more abut the hístory of this fine combo. fRoots obliged.
https://frootsmag.com/looking-back-with-baobab
What a melting pot Dakar was for different musical styles!
Barthélemy Attisso: “When I arrived in Senegal in 1968, there was only Cuban music. Back home in Togo, we were listening to Nigerian highlife and Congolese guitar music, but if you walked past a club in Dakar, you would swear there were Cubans playing inside!”
Here are OB back in the 80s.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WCeCAuXCmHU
Twenty seven years ago I’d taped Specialist I All Stylesand played it in the car on the way up to Newcastle. It was a very hot drive up in the sun and the music suited the weather.
I know it was twenty seven years ago because that weekend I re-met the woman who became my partner and then wife.
That’s a beautiful story Hubert. But how very appropriate that you were listening to Specialist in all styles.
Imagine if you’d been listening to an album by Motorhead or The Wurzels?
That feelgood punchline would not have worked so very well
The Baobs as no one ever calls them have a track on Mojo’s free cd, Werente Seriģne.
They’ve also used the cover for Pirate’s Choice that I remember from the copied cd.