Word: listens
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...term world music gives you hives--and its condescension to musicians (lumping all non-Westerners into a single undifferentiated category) and consumers (writing off anyone who doesn't listen to it as implicitly narrow-minded) is really quite impressive--then grab an EpiPen before reading any further. For we are about to discuss Amadou and Mariam, the world-music stars who are not just a married, middle-aged couple from Mali but a blind, married, middle-aged couple from Mali. By description, they're worthier than the Grameen Bank...
...understand just how great, listen to the pair's fifth album, Welcome to Mali, out March 24. Following up on their 2005 breakthrough, Dimanche � Bamako, which was produced by France-raised Spaniard Manu Chao and topped critics' lists worldwide, Amadou and Mariam recruited another international rock star, Brit Damon Albarn, for a cameo. What Albarn brings is an opener, "Sabali," so light and giddy that no translation is required to get that Mariam is whisper-singing about love. The swirling keyboards and gradually rising dance beat are pure '80s pop, sweeter than cheap champagne--but with soul...
...anxious that she can’t be enjoying her Easter if my boys is acting up. But that ain’t to say I ain’t thinking ‘bout my boys also.”I’d been trying to listen to the sanctuary when Ezekiel finally stopped I heard Reverend Lewis praying. The sermon was here...
...versatile voice, but it doesn’t make up for their lack of creative rhythms. Throughout the album Clarkson does little in the way of innovation, and a number of tracks sound like faceless, impersonal pop production numbers. Album closer “If No One Will Listen,” with its soft instrumentation and gentle verses that lead into a long climactic chorus, recalls Celine Dion. “Long Shot” with its youthful yet raspy sound, along with the leaping motion of the chorus, would sound more at home on a Miley Cyrus album...
...seem to actually have anything to do with the song’s rhythm. The first few tracks ring with an anthemic quality fueled by simple, catchy guitar riffs and en masse, screamed choral parts. While there are no clear standout singles, tracks like “Listen to Your Friends” and “Don’t Let Her Pull You Down” sound like they could find some mainstream success in addition to pleasing the legions of NFG fans who still cry out for albums full of endemically inane subjects and lyrics. The single...