Amadou & Mariam
Dimanche a Bamako

THE REVIEW

With all due respect I have for World Music, with all the love I have for Afro music and the frantic rhythms of the Dark Continent, with all the humanity possible that drives me to accept the condition of the entire African People, and even more, the incredible experience of this "blind" couple who succeeded in "seeing the light"... in short, with this and more, I cannot restrain myself from saying that this album, in the long run, is an interminable bore. When you gotta, you gotta. Please forgive me, beautiful rhythms and typical sounds with influences ranging from Calypso to Rai, with hints of reggae (note the unmistakable touch of Manu Chao in producing tracks like "Senegal Fast Food").

In fact, "Clandestino" actually enters the production of the entire album by rejuvenating the excessively World roots of the duo and enriching the sounds and mixture with more "Western" arrangements and therefore, presumably, more appealing (read "more commercial" or "more business"). Hence the classic Manu touches like the aforementioned "Senegal Fast Food" or "Camion Sauvages", with the classic offbeat guitar, now a trademark of our hero's entire production (and we're waiting to see what "new" thing he'll come up with next, eh eh eh).
Sure, you breathe a "beautiful Africa", positive and sunny in these 15 tracks, choral and cheerful, without, however, really adding anything so special to everything already heard in the field under "Afro and its derivatives". And all this clamor just a year ago? There it is: Manu gets involved and all the media jump on the bandwagon creating a fuss out of nothing (same old story, guys, and there are still some who don't get the trick... blissful youth!).

In short, cute but not essential. I offer a double malt Carlsberg to anyone who manages to listen (read carefully "LISTEN") to it twice in a row! P.S. Rereading everything, I almost feel that I've been too soft, too kind: could it be the advancing age? the repeated scoldings I get from various DeBaserian colleagues not inclined to criticism? or perhaps the weariness of an activity perhaps useless to most? Am I really becoming the tender PUNNY (as someone tells me) instead of the villainous "The Punisher"?