SALLY NYOLO ROCKS...
SANS MAMA!
MULTICULTI Review Interview with Sally Nyolo Performance in Sebastopol, CA
global notesTM ... by David Sharp
SALLY NYOLO ROCKS...SANS MAMA!
MULTICULTI Review Interview with Sally Nyolo Performance in Sebastopol, CA
MULTICULTI ( Tinder Records ) #42854002
I recognized the bikutsi rhythm coming from my radio before I could guess the vocalist. I should haveknown. There is no one who plays the bikutsi, which means "beat the earth," like former ZAP MAMA member, Sally Nyolo. She's dedicated MULTICULTI, her second U.S. release, to this exciting rhythm from the cities and forests of Cameroon , her native country.
With vocal help from Sylvie Nawasadio and Sabine Kabongo, also formerly of ZAP MAMA, Sally's band uses soukous guitar lines, sinuous bass riffs, and lots of instruments from the percussion box to wind up the African rhythms on this cd so tight that the melodies and vocal harmonies seem to be propelled, rather than sung.
"Ndong" starts the set as an interlude with a cappella vocals, percussion and birimbau as Sally sings of warming up to the bikutsi "without dancing the trance." "Djini Djome (The Misleading Beauty)," produced by David Bottril, has a modern feel with brooding organ chords that supply tension underneath a melodic, yet rhythm guitar balafon. The title track, "Multiculti," with its lyric "We the world are different and we love our differences," is sung in Eton (Sally's native language), Spanish, French, English, and Arabic. An electric guitar unobtrusively picks out the plaintive harmony in the background
"Make-Up," with its complex rhythms, multi-percussion, forest Pygmy harmonies and sad lyrics of longing, and "Semengue" (written for a French soundtrack) containing the same dense percussion, may be the two best cuts to show off the bikutsi. Western ears will enjoy the easily accessible reggae-bikutsi "Reggae in Japan," dedicated to a Japanese Rasta family that Sally met while touring with ZAP MAMA. The penultimate song on this CD, "Solidarity," is mesmerizing. Shimmering cymbal work, muted soukous guitar riffs, blended vocal harmonies, and tricky percussion over a roiling bass line work together with African chanting and Sally's use of multi-languages to tell the age-old story of racism. The last track, "Histoire," makes use of 52 seconds of vocal effects and bird calls to tell an African fable and is just one of the little surprises that are sprinkled throughout this thoughtful 15-track collection.What makes this such a compelling recording is the voice of Sally Nyolo with its range and vibrato heard over a rumbling bottom of quivering percussion. Using ambient sounds of children and mouthing jungle noises adds allspice to an already flavorful blend unlike anything heard in the concrete jungles of the West. Sally's timeless lyrics and command of several languages makes this a real "world" music release. MULTICULTI should satisfy music lovers in both camps--the traditionalists and the Afro-pop aficionados. Sally successfully bridges the two, which may be the reason MULTICULTI hit the number one spot in July according to the World Music Charts Europe .
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INTERVIEW WITH SALLY NYOLO
AUGUST 30, 1998DAVID SHARP: Hello Sally. Welcome to the West Coast of America. I have your new cd here with a beautiful picture of you on a cool, deep forest green background, apropos of these hot days. Tell me a little something about your new cd, "MULTICULTI."
SALLY NYOLO: Well, it's my new work and I try to go more inside the rhythm of bikutsi. I always try to use more bikutsi, but on this one I didn't sing in Eton only. I try a bit of English, a bit of French and the song of "Multiculti" I sing in four languages. The roots of "Multiculti" is still Eton, still bikutsi, and the feeling inside--I try to put more of the feelings I have into the music. On "Reggae in Japan," it's a kind of reggae bikutsi. Three years ago in Japan, I was playing with Zap Mama and after the show we went to the city and we visited a Japanese family there, a Rasta Japanese family, and it was very funny because those people only listened to reggae and after visiting that family, I went back and I tried to put the reggae feeling into my bikutsi. "Djini Djome" is a kind of bikutsi, the only one a little bit modern. I tried to put some organ inside, otherwise this record is acoustic. I didn't sing alone. I sing with Sylvie Nawasadio and Sabine Kabongo, my sisters from Zap Mama. They did some backing vocals on this cd and I didn't play all the percussion alone. On the last ones I did (Tribu), I did a lot. I did all the vocals and percussion. On this one I play with a lot of musicians. I play with Paco Sery, Salvadore Douezy, and I play with American percussionist Daniel Moreno.
DS: For those of us who are more familiar with the group Zap Mama, are we going to hear something similar?
SN: It's not very similiar to Zap Mama because Zap Mama was an a cappella band. We tried to sing all the languages of the world. We tried and we did it in an a cappella way and when we wanted to play instruments, we were singing those instruments and here we play with drums, with percussion. This rhythm is coming from the south of Camaroon. It's called bikutsi. It's my native language. Because for me it's not only a rhythm, it's my first language, Eton. But on MULTICULTI I didn't use only the Eton. I tried to put other languages because before with Zap Mama, I used to sing back-up vocals, so now I try to sing a lot of other languages. My wish was that one day I could sing other languages mixed with my language Eton.
DS: I know your passion must be music, Sally, but when you're not writing, producing, touring and singing, what do you like to do?
"The people who live in the forest of Camaroon use bikutsi and it was the rhythm used to help dead people go to paradise."SN: [laughter] You know, the day is not too long for that. I would like to travel just to see people not only for the music. But the music is a very good passport because even when I'm not doing the music, I'm doing the music. I'm still sharing music with people so I would like to travel, to listen to people, to listen to nature.
DS: Paris is your home. But you are originally from Camaroon in Africa. Do you ever go back? Is your family still there?
SN: Yes. I have my father who went back there five years ago. He's retired and he is there and my mother lives with me in Paris, and I have a young sister. I went back three months ago to make a video for French TV and it was wonderful. I stayed for one week. It was great because I went to the big forests, the forests I used to know and there I met the Pygmies and I went there with my percussion. I played music for them from my last cd. They sang a lot of music for me and I could see that the bikutsi that I'm playing in Paris is the same that they are still playing there. I left the big forest and went to the city [in Cameroon] and there I met guitar players, bass players, percussionists, drummers and I played my music and they played their music for me, and I saw that the bikutsi rhythm, the one that I was playing, was the same there. So I went back to Paris very happy and it was great.
DS: Many people associate the makossa style with music from Camaroon. But you keep mentioning the bikutsi. Could you describe what the difference is?
SN: Bikutsi is a very, very, old rhythm. The people who live in the forest of Camaroon use bikutsi and it was the rhythm used to help dead people go to paradise. It was only quick tempo because it is not only a rhythm, but a language. It's the Eton language--the spirit of those people. Even if they don't play music, they play bikutsi because it's the rhythm of the forest. That's why this rhythm is so unique.
When you want to play the bikutsi on guitar, there is a special guitar never seen in any other country. We have something that looks like the birimbau. It's a kind of guitar with four calabasas (squashes), sometimes six, and has ten metal strings, and you can hear the sound of the bass and the guitar and the balafon at the same time that you play on that. The tempo is very, very quick and the musicians can play all day long and never stop. And I never heard a rhythm like that in any other country, even Camaroon, or any other country in Africa. I know that it's very unique and in the beginining a lot of artists and musicians who tried to sing this music in the city find it difficult because the people in the city find it too underground--how to say it--too special. It was forbidden to play bikutsi in the city for many, many years. Artists left Camaroon to play that music elsewhere.
"It was forbidden to play bikutsi in the city for many, many years. Artists left Camaroon to play that music elsewhere."
DS: What musicians are you listening to now?
SN: [laughter] Well, the fact is I am always, always, always doing my music, so I don't often have so much time to listen to other music.
DS: What message do you have for us here on the West Coast?
SN: I would like you to hear the rhythms coming from the forests of Africa, from the forests of Camaroon, because this is the language of people who have a very positive spirit and I enjoy sharing that language with my musicians from all over the world. We are not only Camaroon musicians, we are from all over. When we come here to bring you this music, it makes us happy and we try to bring you happiness, too.
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Sally Nyolo "Opens the Ears of America" Tour
September 4, 1998
Sebastopol--Walking onto an empty stage in front of a huge backdrop of an African village, Sally Nyolo proved that she doesn't need ZAP MAMA by not wasting any time getting into a groove. Followed one at a time by her musicians, she and her five-piece band set the rhythm that immediately provoked a groundswell of approval as the audience began to break out of their seats for the dance floor. Her famous bikutsi rhythms had fans rocking to the latest beat to come out of Africa.
Stopping in Sebastopol, California, midway on a national tour, Sally started her show with lead and bass guitarists, a drummer, and two vocalists, who have an uncanny resemblance to ZAP MAMA's Sylvie Nawasadio and Sabine Kabongo.
Focusing on strong African polyrhythms, Sally Nyolo opened her first set with songs from her critically acclaimed U.S. release TRIBU (Tinder Records) . A seasoned performer, her confidence and polish were evident as she bonded with the audience through song introductions and stories in a charming Parisienne/Cameroonian accent.
The second set included almost all the songs on her latest release, MULTICULTI. Most were sung in her native language, Eton, except the verses to the title track, which were performed in five different languages. Wearing green leather-wrapped braids and multi-colored scarfs, Sally was in full control as she pulled percussion instruments from her leather belt to add another layer of rhythm to the bikutsi. Her traditional Pygmy harmonies and chants worked to break a sweat from this Northern California crowd.
MULTICULTI 's strongest selections, "Reggae in Japan," "Bingo Bingole," and "Djini Djome" tested the ability of the sound engineer as percussion piled on top of percussion, and chanted bird calls and complex harmonies all had to be fattened out to survive the live mix in an accoustically challenged community center hall.
A very unassuming Sally Nyolo walked off after converting the almost full house into true believers. Her hypnotic vocals and the band's solid wall of rhythm gave rise to calls for encores. In the end, she gave Sebastopol almost two hours of unforgettable music before climbing back on the bus to finish her 20-city national tour.
This performance was a benefit for the United African Club, which in the past has introduced to Sonoma County African superstars Pepe Kalle and the talented guitarist Rigo Star .
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