Oliba International

2018 release. Oliba International sets the scene and transports us to an elsewhere both near and far, neither quite rural, nor quite urban: the quintet invites us to a tropical and popular dust ball. The group has adopted the Afro music codes that accompany daily life during celebrations, weddings or funerals: Congolese rumba sebene, Madagascar tsapiky, New Orleans second line, Kenya benga. Their goal ? The warming up, bringing the audience to dance and trance, making it come back in a pan of solar saxophone riffs and ultra-fast guitar, on the hot coals of a freed subaphone and a steadfast bass drum, at the heart of the devilish crackling of a hallucinated snare drum. Of the roles usually attributed to each instrument: here we are in polyphony, sometimes written and sometimes improvised; each one contributes to develop simple themes, perennial, endearing.