Alekpehanhou

Alekpehanhou – Roi du Zinli Rénové

Polyrhythmic spirals courtesy of this zinli music cassette from Benin, for your journey to the other world. I am reveling in the beautiful, unified restraint of the elements here, boiled down to a persistent essence of drums, bells and vocals that linger like smoke in the mix. The eminently informative VOA African Treasures blog has some details on Alekpehanhou and the state of traditional music listening in Benin.

Face A

5 Comments

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Gathering Tornadoreply
May 23, 2012 at 3:12 am

this is fucking astounding

kingpossumreply
May 28, 2012 at 10:08 pm

Terrific piece you did for the Collateral Damage column in The Wire, issue 340. Not a cut’n dried situation you are plumbing with becoming a netlabel, and your concerns and arguments on different sides of the fence are true and admirable.

Bottom line is the music is being heard, the artists are being recognized and rewarded, the world is richer culturally for what you are doing.

Many thanks,

Kennyreply
June 24, 2012 at 12:48 pm

What an amazing album. I’m glad I downloaded this, I’ll probably listen to it for ages now.

Roi Alekpehanhou — Sato Na Hangna – Awesome Tapes From Africa Awesome Tapes From Africareply
May 27, 2015 at 5:00 pm

[…] subject of a previous post, the Roi du Zinli Renove, as he is known in Benin, merits an additional look. His music is heavy. […]

llreply
September 13, 2018 at 10:08 am

the first track links to the second song. If you change the url you can download ‘Zozo Piaa!’

http://traffic.libsyn.com/awesometapesfromafrica/Alekpehanhou_zozo.mp3

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