It was inevitable that two simultaneously-released albums featuring new approaches to Afro-Peruvian music would get reviewed as a pair to be contrasted and compared. Jamie Renton deals with them in the new fRoots and comes to same conclusion as most of the rest of us, that the Radio Kijada album holds up better, more likely to surprise and being less dependant on the programmed rhythms that eventually undermine enjoyment of the new one from Novalima.  I surprise myself by going back to the track by Radiokijada that was first introduced as a pre-release promo sampler, having been impressed to discover that it was not really typical of the rest of the album. Typical or not, it still carries authority.

It turns out that the album by Imam Baildi, only recently serviced to the media in the UK, has been available in Greece and Spain for some time. Reactions to previous plays are divided between those who welcome it as a fresh revelation and those who despair at the damage done to favourite recordings from the 1950s. I’m still on the side of newly converted.

Most of the back-to-back pairings that appear in these programmes are intuitive, based on a feeling that the atmosphere of one track will fit comfortably against that of its neighbour. Occasionally, as I sit in the studio contemplating what to say before or afterwards, I discover a different reason why they may belong together. Baaba Maal’s new album is produced by an outfit of uncertain nationality who call themselves the Brazilian Girls. They are actually New York-based and their singer is Italian, Simona. Beto Villares is a real Brazilian producer, being responsible for the great work on last year’s best seller by CéU. His own debut album is a curious mixture of fascinating innovation and irritating cliché. I have not worked out which voice is his, among several contributors to ‘África lá’, but CéU is heard among the backing singers.

The album by Mamer from the North West of China is another uneven affair, not maintaining the promise of the opening title track, which somehow seemed the perfect set-up for our final offering. Muharrem Ertas (1913 – 1984) is a much-revered Turkish singer whose unearthly voice seemed so impossible to follow, he had to have the last track.

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