Want to speak French, Want to go to Africa

Last Saturday, Amadou & Mariam came to the Paradise and there wasn’t a skinny jean in sight.  I don’t know where all these French speaking, dancing, excitable folks came from but it was refreshing to be at the rock club and surrounded by a totally different crowd.  Other people do exist.  I drank my PBR to them. The show opened with a pretty good band called Club d’Elf, which is not totally my thing but fun nonetheless.  Apparently they have been around for years and are, in fact, from Jamaica Plain – so that means that all guys in the Boston area have a chance of meeting that AMAZING belly dancer if they so choose to make the effort.  She was incredible.  So, not only do I want to speak French and go to Africa, but I want to learn how to dance like that.

Amadou and Mariam are married.  They are blind.  They are from Mali.  They have back up dancers and incredible drummers and are absolutely adorable and clearly liked what they were doing and are clearly good at it. Their song “Sabali” is on Pitchfork’s Best Tracks of 2008,  and was produced by my love Damon Albarn.  It’s the opening track and his presence is insight into why those who are longtime fans of the couple see a distinctive change in this latest album.  In my opinion it’s a good change and takes nothing away from their past.  We move on, we change, we get better.  If not, things are looking pretty plain vanilla, no?

Read a review of the latest album here.