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| Pitchfork |
 In southeastern Algeria, there is a vast plateau set aside as a national park called Tassili N'Ajjer. It's close to the border with Libya, and years ago, in the 1980s and early 90s, it was a place of relatively safe passage for Kel Tamashek fighters moving between the refugee camps in Libya and the battlefront in northern Mali. To look at it in satellite images, you might think you were looking at he surface of some distant moon, long ago scarred by geologic activity but now barren and strangely beautiful. It wasn't always this way. Thousands of ancient cave and rock paintings dating from 8,000 to around 1,700 years ago depict a place of plenty that slowly dried to become the modern desert. There are lost religions and civilizations out there.The Tassili N'Ajjer covers some 45,000 square miles. Near the southern rim of the plateau is a town called Djanet, and it's out in the rocky desert near this town that Tinariwen chose to record its fifth album. The group would have preferred to record near its homebase, Tessalit, in northern Mali, but the security situation was too precarious. The re-flaring of a conflict the group hoped was put to bed clouds some of the album they made-- the first couplet on the album, sung in weary Tamashek by Ibrahim Ag Alhabib, translates to, "What have you got to say, my friends, about this painful time we're living through?" It's not only about the new conflict, though. From there, the song calls out to people who have given up the nomadic life of the desert, lamenting that they've left but seeming to understand why they have....full text |
| Guardian |
| It's not always a good sign when a band (or their producer) invite special guests to join in on a recording or add overdubs later, and what we have here is a brave, mostly impressive no-nonsense acoustic set that includes a batch of unnecessary collaborations. Tinariwen are a brilliant live band who have deservedly built up an international following for their infectious, pounding fusion of desert blues and the styles of the nomadic Tuareg people of the Sahara. After their last album, the charming, surprisingly laid-back Imidiwan, I had been expecting a return to the electric guitars and energy of their live shows or their classic Aman Iman. Instead, they have produced their most sparse, gentle album to date. Recorded in a desert town in southern Algeria, it's a set that, at its best, matches rhythmic, stuttering acoustic guitar work with soulful vocals from Ibrahim Ag Alhabib on simple, sad-edged songs, such as the stirring Imidiwan Win Sahara or the bluesy Aden Osamnat. However, there are unnecessary added guitar effects from Nels Cline of Wilco, or jazz-edged horn work from New Orleans's Dirty Dozen Brass Band, who sound as if they are trying to hijack the soulful ballad Ya Messinagh. There are also unremarkable vocals in English from the New York band TV on the Radio – but at least they went out to Algeria to join in....full text |
| Musicomh |
| Over the past couple of decades, a number of West African artists have taken advantage of a new international interest in ‘world’ music to gain attention beyond their own countries. Yet while one can imagine the likes of Vieux Farka Touré and Toumani Diabaté feeling equally at home in Paris or London as Bamako these days, there’s still something wild and untamed about Tinariwen that sets them apart from their fellow Malians. As a nation straddling the divide between the vast wilderness of the Sahara desert and the greener savannah to the south, Mali is also a meeting point of several disparate cultures. As nomadic Tuaregs, the music of Tinariwen varies greatly from those performers from more settled village traditions such as Touré and Diabaté. Their name actually translates as ‘deserts’ and while they may use electric guitars and other modern instruments, the core of their sound is still as raw and elemental as the harsh landscape inhabited by their ancestors since time immemorial, and their songs speak passionately about the issues their stateless people continue to face. Many of their older members were rebel fighters and refugees during a period of armed conflict with the Malian government, giving them a slightly different type of life experience to say, Coldplay. Founded as far back as 1979 but not ‘discovered’ by French world music ensemble Lo’Jo until 1998, Tinariwen’s two most recent albums – 2007’s Aman Iman and Imidiwan two years later – consolidated their status as a major crossover act, culminating in a Glastonbury appearance in 2009. Recorded in the depths of the Algerian desert, Tassili is something of a back to basics album for the freewheeling collective after their years of global jet setting, but it also sees them take a further step forward by adding some new ingredients to their tried and tested formula. As the first notes of Imidiwan Ma Tenam bleed forth from the speakers, the initial impression is that not much has changed. Traditional Tuareg melodies are chanted atmospherically over a backdrop of freeform guitar and rhythmic handclaps, with some subtle drumming underpinning the campfire groove. But weaving his way almost imperceptibly into the mix is Wilco lead guitarist Nels Cline, who was also involved in Tassili’s post-production....full text |
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