LE BLÉ ET LE MIL

Toubabou' first album is mixed affair between a typical Quebecois jazz-rock group fusing their music with a separate African group. If you check out the track titles it will be easily understood which tracks are from our Quebecois musos and played by them exclusively. The tracks with more exotic titles are interacions in between Toubabou and their African friends from Mali, Senegal and Togo. The title says it all as Le Blé (wheat) Et Le Mil (millet the african wheat equivalent), and all of this financed by official cultural funds. This was recorded at the Superfrancofetes in August 74. The project leader is percussionist Michel Seguin of so many different collabs during those years. The man has such talents that he could've fitted anytime in a Santana line-up.

Toubabou's tracks are your typical jazz-rock track being extendly deveopped byall those Quebec combos during the formidable era of cultural identity revolution ( between 73 and 79 to 81 at most) and Oasis is exactly a textbook case for this style. I do not think a proghead somewhat reticent to jazz sonorities can still be after listening to the sheer beauty of this 10 min track going through all sorts of ambiance and Lise Cousineau's wordless vocals. Toubabou is more electric than say Maneige, Solstice or L' Orchetre Sympathique, but not more so than Sloche , Contraction, Opus-5, Aquarelle and a few others. Ambush is definitely more funky and incorporates African percussion and the huge latino-african precussion break (rather tedious nowadays but back then..) and the obligartory reprise by a super funky bass. This so, four years before Chic.

The more ethnic tracks range from the almost totally ( but rather lenghty)African chants and percussions to a Mali deser blues and developping into a strange Acadian trad folk song in the following track, making the Carignan track sound a bit Cajun music from the Louisiana Bayous. Really worth the detour at leat once. Yama Nekh is a very funky african jazz-rock track with Cousineau singing in African idioms/dalects in duo with another singer. Very impressive indeed!!! The last track is a devil-induced rythms patterns (sometimes sounding like Santana in Soul Sacrifice) with a great searing guitar solo and frantic Fender Rhodes etc.

The Cd release is now coming with two video tracks (B&W and of poor quality but so enjoyable anyway) but visible only on a computer. Odd choice! Although much less even than h following album , I prefer this one because of glimpses of absolute brilliance an adventure Nevertheless this is really an album that gives a meaning to fusion. A must for adventurous progheads!!!!