More Misery In Mali

When I worked at Warner Bros, I visited our French company as often as I could and I usually would go see a band at the now infamous Bataclan Theatre. I saw some of our French bands play there-- like Les Negresses Vertes-- but once to see the Queens of the Stone Age, who were the progenitor of the Eagles of Death Metal. I wanted to see them play live because they covered a Romeo Void song I had an interest in (above).

Even when I went to Mali a few years ago there was a music component-- a trip out to Quizambougou to watch Bassekou Kouyate finish recording his second album. We were staying in Bamako, where I saw Bassekou play a live show at the French Cultural Center, and where, most recently a group of Daesh-related terrorists shot up the Radisson Blu Hotel and took over 100 guests hostage, killing 18 of them as well as a security guard.

The attack on the Radisson Blu hotel in the Malian capital Bamako, which killed 19 people, is the latest terrorist act on an African continent now stricken daily by fundamentalist horror and obscurantism.

Despite billions of dollars pledged to address this scourge, terrorism thrives in Africa due to the failure of states, the plundering of resources, and endemic corruption. Al-Qaeda, Al-Shabaab, Boko Haram, and more recently the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) have engaged in deadly and constant destabilization in the hope of extending their power.

...The recently released Global Terrorism Index confirms this increase in violence. Boko Haram is ranked the deadliest organization with 6,644 deaths in 2014, compared with 6,073 for ISIS. Even as it loses ground to the Nigerian army, Boko Haram has multiplied its attacks, primarily against markets and public gatherings. Regular attacks in Mali and Kenya suggest that Al-Qaeda and Al-Shabaab will continue contributing to this violent one-upmanship.

Opening the second Dakar International Forum on Security in Africa on Nov. 9, Senegalese President Macky Sall reiterated his call for more resources. However, addressing terrorism in Africa demands more than financial means. According to him, the framework of intervention based on U.N. peacekeeping operations, to which his country is a major contributor, needs to adapt. The urgency of the situation requires fighting rather than simply maintaining peace.

Above and beyond the State Department's warning to Americans about travel, Mali was singled out even before this latest attack as a place to stay away from, a real shame in light of what an incredibly unique and fascinating place it is for American tourists. (That Radisson Blu, didn't have tourists but business people staying there.)

The U.S. Department of State warns U.S. citizens of the risks of travel to Mali. We especially warn against travel to the northern parts of the country and along the border with Mauritania because of ongoing military operations and threats of attacks and kidnappings targeting westerners. Mali faces significant security challenges because of the presence in northern Mali of extremists and militant factions. The potential for attacks throughout the country, including in Bamako, remains. This Travel Warning replaces the Travel Warning dated January 13, 2015.

Violent extremist and militant elements, including al- Qaeda in the Lands of Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), Ansar al-Dine, the Movement for Oneness and Jihad (MUJAO), and al-Murabitun are present in northern Mali. While these extremist elements have been mostly dislodged from the major population centers of Gao and Timbuktu, they continue to conduct attacks targeting security forces in and around these locations.

During the past year, there has been an increase in attacks targeting the United Nations peacekeepers of the Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali (MINUSMA). Rocket attacks targeting MINUSMA camps in various northern locations were reported. In addition, separate violent incidents involving suicide bombings, explosives, and land mines have occurred. The majority of these incidents resulted in numerous injuries and casualties.

Terrorist groups have increased their rhetoric calling for additional attacks or kidnapping attempts on westerners and others, particularly those linked to support for international military intervention.

While the security situation in Bamako and southern Mali has been relatively stable, on March 7, there was an armed attack on La Terrasse, a nightclub in the Hippodrome area of Bamako, in which a French citizen, a Belgian citizen, and three Malian citizens were killed. The Government of Mali has increased security in the capital, but the potential for additional attacks targeting Westerners in the capital city and throughout the country remains. Police harassment and violent crime in Bamako persist, including several armed carjacking incidents, one of which resulted in the death of a French citizen.

...The U.S. Embassy reminds U.S. citizens of the potential for terrorist activity throughout Mali. U.S. citizens are urged to exercise caution, be alert to their surroundings, and avoid crowds, demonstrations, or any other form of public gatherings when visiting locations frequented by westerners, in and around Bamako. Periodic public demonstrations occur throughout Mali. While most demonstrations are peaceful, a few have become confrontational. U.S. citizens throughout Mali should develop a personal security plan. We recommend you vary your daily routine, and travel only on main roads to the extent this is possible. Malian security forces regularly update security safeguards, including checkpoints and other movement control measures, without prior notice.

They also warn about unsafe domestic air flights and Ebola.

Bamako doesn't have much to offer, other than a good restaurant-- if it's still open (which I doubt). But the really great things to see in Mali are accessed through Bamako via insecure roads. As much as I loved Djenne, Timbuktu, the Dogon country and experiencing the birthplace of the blues, there's nothing that would get me there at this point. In fact, today there was another terrorist attack, this one up north in Kidal, where UN peacekeepers were targeted and several were killed by mortar shells.

Bassekou Kouyate Live In Los Angeles-- Tonight... Free

Earlier this month I was practically apologizing for writing about my favorite new restaurant in L.A. on my travel site because... well, because it's in L.A. and so am I, and I just have to drive 15 minutes to get there. And here I am back with the L.A. stuff again. Kind of. It's L.A. via Mali.

If you follow my travel blog at all, you may recall that a couple years ago I was wandering around Mali and Senegal. While waiting for my friend Roland to arrive so we could head out to the world's biggest mud mosque in Djenne and then on to the unpaved wilds of Dogon country, I somehow wound up in Ali Farka Toure's recording studio watching Bassekou Kouyate complete I Speak Fula, the follow up to Segu Blue, his widely acclaimed 2007 international debut album.

In the way of context, let me tell you I've been very lucky with music in my life. Even before becoming president of Reprise Records, I had always had good music juju. I was knee-high to spit when I snuck off to the Brooklyn Paramount Theater to catch Maxine Brown. Not only did she sing my favorite song, Oh No, Not My Baby, but she came out the stage door afterwards and gave me a big kiss and an autograph that I treasured until I went to Afghanistan 5 years later. In the interim I booked concerts at my school by Jimi Hendrix, The Doors, The Temptations, The Fugs, Muddy Waters, Howling Wolf, Big Brother & the Holding Company, Pink Floyd, The Who, Jefferson Airplane, Otis Redding, The Byrds, the Dead... all the regular stuff we used to dance around to in college back then. And I was a dj and so on. Even when my music juju screwed up, it didn't screw up too bad. I once drove all the way to some village near Lyallpur in Pakistan, the familial home of the famous Ali Brothers (of my most enjoyable acid trips) only to find the Ali Brothers, Nazakat and Salamat, the world's greatest Qawwali singers, away on a concert tour. Years later I was working in a meditation center in Amsterdam and someone persuaded me to go upstairs to hear some "trippy Indian music" and it was... Nazakat and Salamat Ali Khan. Point: I've seen everyone (except The Beatles, all of whom I've seen individually). And the further point, when I saw Bassekou is the Jimi Hendrix of the ngoni, a description that is now widely used, and that the concert I saw him play at the French Cultural Center in Bamako was one of the greatest and most inspired live shows I've ever seen in my life... well, it's not like some kid telling you about the first live music he's ever seen. I knew Jimi Hendrix when he was the lead guitarist for the Night Hawks fronting John Hammond. He did his first American concert after he became the Jimi Hendrix Experience for me and that night I watched incredulously as he and my mother smoked a joint. I hung out with him in Essaouira and saw him play at the Isle of Wight Festival before he died and I went off in search of the Alis.

That said, Bassekou is not just playing in L.A. this evening (Sunday), he's playing a free show-- at Amoeba Records on Sunset, around the corner from that favorite L.A. restaurant I was talking about! If you're in the L.A. area-- unless you're lucky enough to have tickets for one of the shows at the Getty Center-- don't miss this chance.

Bassekou plays ngoni on President Obama's favorite record, Kulanjan but he's not well know in the U.S. yet, although he's a superstar in Africa and on his way to being one in Europe. This is what I wrote after seeing him play in Bamako:

I don't know how to describe the concert without losing the essence of what the music did for everyone involved-- both on and off the stage. Let me tell you, though, as magnificent as the recorded versions of his songs are, the live show is what makes it so amazing. The concert defined hot. When those syncopated rhythms get going, there is no resisting their power. Mali is the birthplace of the blues-- and the blues is still very much alive and vibrant here-- and it is the ancestral home of rock'n'roll in every imaginable way. Bassekou has that coursing through his blood and he knows exactly how to convey it to the audience.

And the dancing was as good as the music! Absolutely breathtaking! Truthfully, I can't remember the last time music compelled me to jump out of my seat and dance in the aisle. Last night it did.

I found this video on YouTube-- Bassekou at the Orange Peel in Asheville, NC a couple weeks ago. I wonder if Heath Shuler made it to the show. Bassekou will be in Savannah on April 2nd and I'll definitely tell Regina Thomas to check it out; it's right up her alley. In this clip it looks like a local banjo player found his way onto the stage; you can tell who he is because he's the one with the store-bought instrument. If you're in L.A., hasta luego. Otherwise, Bassekou's U.S. tour schedule is here. Wow! 4 nights in Minneapolis and three in Lafayette, Louisiana!

Howie reports from Mali: Bassekou is the Jimi Hendrix of the ngoni

"I'll bet Bassekou will become a real superstar in the U.S."

When last we heard from Howie, he had just heard Malian musical legend Basskeou Kouyate performing in the recording studio, and was looking forward to his live concert. He promised a follow-up report, and here it is. -- Ken


Bassekou, Master of the Ngoni, Rocks the House

Thursday I went out to Quizambougou to watch Bassekou Kouyate finish recording his second album, a follow-up to his amazing debut, Segu Blue. Like the first one, the new songs were being recorded at the famed Studio Bogolan across the way from Mali K7, Ali Farka Toure's foundation. (Ali Farka's son, in fact, played his father's guitar on Bassekou's new album.)

Bassekou isn't well known in the U.S. yet -- he's never been to our side of the Atlantic -- but he's a real star in Africa and Europe, wildly popular in Mali, and recognized as the best ngoni player in the world. The ngoni is kind of a cross between a banjo and a guitar, and what Bassekou does with it is pure magic. The music I heard in the studio seemlessly combined the two goals Bassekou set out to accomplish with his new album: respect for Mali's rich musical tradition, in which he is steeped, and an opportunity to explore the directions his own muse is drawing him.

I did my best to persuade him to come play in the U.S. and made a fun suggestion to help him gain some recognition there. If he follows my advice, you'll recognize it instantly when you hear the album.

I had an opportunity to meet two musical legends at the studio: BBC presenter/musicologist/producer Lucy Duran, who is probably best-known in the U.S. as the producer of President Obama's favorite album, Kulanjan by Taj Mahal, and Malian kora master Toumani Diabate. (I might add that the ngoni player on that album was, of course, Bassekou.) Anyway, Lucy is the most credible producer of West Africa music anywhere, speaking the local languages and having worked on Toumani's own records as well as with Kasse Mady Diabate and with Yasmin Levy. The sound engineer she and Bassekou were working with was Jerry Boys, one of the world's best -- a guy who recorded everyone (literally) from the Beatles, Stones, Pink Floyd, and REM to Ry Cooder, Buena Vista Social Club and Ali Farka Toure! (I recall him working with Everything But the Girl when I worked at Sire.)

Anyway, the studio was packed with TV, radio and print jounalists, as well as photographers from the record label and the media. It's like everyone in Mali who loves music -- and in Mali that means everyone -- is eagerly awaiting the new Bassekou record.

The happy citizens of Bamako didn't have to wait for the release to hear some of the new material. Friday night Basselou was onstage at the French Cultural Center doing a full-fledged concert. You think I went?

It was only about a mile from my hotel, so I walked over early. Bassekou had told me his sons have an ngoni band, and asked me to show up in time to hear them. I'm glad I did; you can see their influences, and they were pretty good.

But it was Bassekou's nine-piece extravaganza that well could have been the best live performance I had ever seen in my whole life -- and I've been seeing concerts since the early '60s, and haven't missed too many artists. The first time I was in Africa was in 1969, and I was hanging out with Jimi Hendrix in Essaouira, in Morocco. The first time I had seen Jimi play was years before that at the Cafe au Go-Go, when he was the guitar player in the Night Hawks, backing up John Hammond Jr. I don't say this lightly: Bassekou Kouyate is the Jimi Hendrix of the ngoni.

I don't know how to describe the concert without losing the essense of what the music did for everyone involved -- both on and off the stage. Let me tell you, though, as magnificent as the recorded versions of his songs are, the live show is what makes it so amazing. The concert defined hot. When those syncopated rhythms get going, there is no resisting their power. Mali is the birthplace of the blues -- and the blues is still very much alive and vibrant here -- and it is the ancestral home of rock 'n' roll in every imaginable way. Bassekou has that coursing through his blood, and he knows exactly how to convey it to the audience.

And the dancing was as good as the music! Absolutely breathtaking! Truthfully, I can't remember the last time music compelled me to jump out of my seat and dance in the aisle. Last night it did. If Bassekou and his band wind up on Leno or Oprah, they'll open America up to its own musical roots, and I'll bet Bassekou will become a real superstar in the U.S.

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Cross-posted from Howie's travel blog: First Day In Mali

The pride of Mali: Bassekou Kouyate, master of the ngoni

[Note: This item, with update, appeared today. (A further post, "You Can't Always Count On The Guide Books, a sequel to the first Senegal post, cross-posted here," appeared on Monday.) -- Ken]

Ahhhh . . . Mali, land of my dreams; well, that might be a little exaggeration, but ever since I was a kid, I always wanted to go to Timbuktu. And after I read Paul Bowles' The Sheltering Sky, I knew for sure I would travel to that city someday (even though I have a feeling it was set in Gao, not Timbuktu; just a guess).

A few years ago Roland and I drove to the end of the road in Morocco, Mahamid, where there is nothing but flies and sand dunes and a guy and his son willing to take you out into the desert on camel. And a big blue sign that says something to the effect of "Timbuktu 52 days (by camel)." We decided to go with the guy and his son for a jaunt into the Sahara -- but not all the way to Mali.

Today I finally arrived. Senegal does not prepare you at all -- except that they share a language (French) and a currency (CFA). The weather in Dakar was very pleasant, around 80 by day with a nice breeze off the ocean and high 60s/low 70s at night. Bamako, the Malian capital, isn't an inferno, but close enough. It's hot and dusty.

And Dakar is almost like Europe in comparison. In Dakar you can't open your eyes without seeing at least one white face -- 25,000 Frenchmen live there, and at least as many Lebanese. Here I haven't seen any white people since I arrived. I sat next to a French anthropologist on the 90-minute plane ride from Dakar, and she told me there are about 2,000 French residents and the same number of Lebanese. I also ran into quite a few missionaries and missionary children on the plane and in the airport, including a huge guy and his huger wife and two huge children who are stationed way in the interior in a small town I had never heard of. He said he's from Iowa but he was born here -- his parents having been missionaries too -- and has lived here all his life, although goes back to Iowa every few years to visit.

So far -- and I know this is unrelated to everything else I'm about to experience in Mali -- the infrastructure is superb. The highway from the airport was excellent, far better than Dakar's in every way, although where the Dakar 'burbs looked pretty well off and even glitzy, the Bamako 'burbs could have been almost anywhere in the Third World. I kept flashing back to Pakistan.

I'm staying at the Hotel Salam and OMG! It is really top of the line, not just top of the line for a dumpy place but really nice for anywhere. The hotel in Dakar, the Sokhamon, was small (31 rooms) and boutique-y, with a certain charm but hobbled by amateur management. This place is impeccable. I might add that the price for a single is CFA 90,000, but I had made a reservation online and it was only CFA 50,000. It's hard to translate that into dollars, because the exchange rate for the dollar is absurd and if you change your money into euros and then buy CFA with Euros, the difference -- in your favor! -- is a lot.

OK, I went to sleep after I wrote that last paragraph, my Internet time having expired, and today is . . . hot and dusty and humid. The hotel computers, fancy as they look, aren't working, so I walked a mile or so to a market area and found an Internet cafe that is in pretty good shape and cheaper than the hotel's (of course). The town is very spread out -- the opposite of extremely compact Dakar.

People here seem less outgoing and exuberant than in Senegal, where everyone was ready to party at any time. People seem more shy and standoffish here. There are a plethora of "guides" who have overcome this. The hotel is still nice the morning after, but below the spit and polish . . . well, I should temper my gushing enthusiasm a little, although the food in the restaurant was excellent and there is wonderful Malian music in every public space.


UPDATE: ANOTHER PERSPECTIVE AFTER A FULL DAY

And what a day! A travel tip for this part of the world: be sure to print out your confirmed reservations for everything. None of the hotels or airlines have had records of my reservations. OK, that was today's travel tip.

What an amazing place Bamako is! Forget what I said about it reminding me of backwater Pakistan; that was just the fancy superficial sights. You can't imagine what this is like once you get out of the modern business-tourist ghetto. I keep imagining that Dogon country is going to be the most primitive place I've ever been to. The back alleys of Bamako . . . well it makes Pakistan look like NYC!

But this is the most pro-American place I've been to since Clinton was president. And it's more than just the predictable pictures of Obama everywhere. There are USA decals and stickers and flag symbols in taxis and all over the place. I saw more albinos than white people, but there are a couple of thousand French people living here. Still, it seems like it is the U.S. that has captured the imagination of the people. Feels good after years and years of everyone hating America everywhere 'cause the fucking rednecks, fascists and greedheads got Bush into office!

Anyway, I was all over town today. Taxis are cheap; anyplace in town costs either 1,000, 1,500 or 2,000, depending on a combination of distance, your bargaining skills and how willing you are to whore out some Obama stories. After a full day -- including the discovery of a fantastic Moroccan restaurant called La Rose des Sables, just down the street from the Chinese Embassy. One warning: "vegetarian" doesn't necessarily mean "no meat," only that there are vegetables in the dish.

The highlight of the day, though, was a trip to the studio where Mali's greatest musician, Bassekou, is recording his follow-up record. This guy is great, and what an amazing band he's put together. I'll do a post on that once I can uploads some pics and music and after I see the live concert tomorrow night.

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