Youssou N'Dour
The Guide (Wommat)

LA RECENSIONE

Youssou N'Dour and "The Guide (Wommat)", a simply fantastic album, an artist who starts from the Senegalese tradition of strong and distinct rhythm dances called "mbalax" to arrive at an astonishing afro-pop intertwining that allows him to meet Great Artists like Gabriel, Simon, Sting, Sakamoto, and others who want him in their masterpieces, for the love of his African sound and rhythm blended with modern and international music, bringing him immediate popularity.
Peter Gabriel is so amazed by the album "Immigrés" that he always wants him by his side in his works, starting with the duet "In Your Eyes" from the album "So". A man always in tune with the problems of his land and for social battles, a champion of Amnesty International, and a UNICEF ambassador, he makes music his main true instrument of style and life value, transmitting it in the form of a simple message, to be understood by those who have the will and strength to grasp it. He always uses the Senegalese language "wolof" as the base, and "mbalax" which is the "talking" drum for communication between peoples: they are of primary importance, as well as incessant hypnotizers of listening. He receives influences from jazz and Latin American musicians, from pop, rock, and reggae currents, but so much "tama", key of popular dances.

In a new wave context, Youssou N'Dour is the most representative interpreter of the enchanting Senegalese beauty, to speak of "The Guide" and to find a defining judgment for each track is quite impossible and superfluous, to say "7 seconds" is to say absolute magic, it leaves a deep groove in music and so do the rest of the tracks on this album: they are an infinite inseparable of constant and compelling delicacy. Multicolored sounds that arise from trumpets, bass, trombones, from Brad Wheeler's sax, relentless percussion, and naturally from the Wolof language.

Fifteen tracks that accompany a perpetual journey in warm lands that capture hidden desires. It is a masterpiece of innate quality.