Last year, we shared a special single by Zambian guitarist, singer and songwriter Paul Ngozi – who, along with his Ngozi Family, will be presented in a compendium on Now-Again in late 2012. This year, we present something a bit harder-edged, in keeping with the garage-psych tradition of the Ngozi Family’s early recordings. “Jesus Christ” is from Ngozi’s The Ghetto, an album that we’ve recently reissued in conjunction with Shadoks Music. If you’re a follower of the music we reissue, this should be a perfect Christmas carol.
Download: Paul Ngozi: “Jesus Christ”.
And, if you missed it last year:
Download: Paul Ngozi: “Happy New Year”.
Last year, American journalist Chris Smith journeyed to Zambia to interview WITCH’s Emmanuel “Jagari” Chanda, Amanaz’s Keith Kabwe and the select few remaining Zamrock musicians he could find. He recently published his story in South Africa’s Mail & Guardian. An excerpt is below; follow the link to the full story. Fill yourself in as we ready our 4CD/6LP WITCH anthology – scheduled for release in May of 2012.
” Although sub-Saharan Africa isn’t much known for rock ‘n roll, for a brief period in the late 1960s and 1970s, young guys from Nigeria to South Africa picked up guitars and started playing like Deep Purple. The lion’s share of these groups hailed from Zambia. The biggest band was the Witch, and Jagari, an Africanisation of Mick Jagger’s name, was the lead singer. Fusing the pop sensibility of the Stones, the fuzzed-out guitars of Cream and homegrown kalindula rhythms, the Witch toured all over Southern Africa, from Botswana to Kenya, playing to thousands at stadium shows. ‘The Witch were the band,” says Errol Hickey, the Zambian entertainment impresario and former chairperson of Lusaka’s Radio Phoenix. “They blew people’s minds, eh?’ ”
Read the full article: “Up From The Underground” by Chris Smith (South Africa Mail & Guardian, Sunday, 11.25.11).
Download: WITCH: “Strange Dream.”
More info on our Zambian “Zamrock” reissues here.
The Red Bull Music Academy brought WITCH’s bandleader Emmanuel “Jagari” Chanda to Madrid, Spain to discuss the history of Zambia’s Zamrock scene with Egon. You can watch the entire two hour interview below – and stay tuned for a two part Zamrock special on Red Bull Music Academy radio. We’ll post the links – we promise!
Link: Egon and Emmanuel “Jagari” Chanda at Red Bull Music Academy.
We’re pleased to announce that the New York Daily News was so impressed by our investigations into global psychedelic funk music that they dedicated an article to it. Alongside discussions about our forthcoming Indonesian psych-funk compendium Those Shocking Shaking Days, writer Jim Farber had this to say:
“As it turns out, psychedelia’s glow didn’t only affect musicians in its clichéd epicenters but in places as far off as Ghana, Tehran and Manila all through the ’70s.
Only lately, though, has the full scope of these sounds come to light, many through the efforts of a company called Now-Again Records. Indian-American owner Eothen Alapatt began putting out collections of this swirling music in 2009 with “Forge Your Own Chains: Heavy Psychedelic Ballads and Dirges 1968 to 1974.” It featured mind-bending cuts by period acts born in Colombia, Sweden, South Korea and elsewhere. From there, the company started traipsing the world, territory by territory, to issue in the last year alone collections by psych bands centered in India, Zambia and Indonesia…
…f ew have exceeded Now-Again’s eagerness and breadth, not to mention their sumptuous packaging and obsessively detailed liner notes.”
Read More: New York Daily News – “It’s A Trip, Man…”
More: Indonesian Psych on Now-Again/Those Shocking Shaking Days Anthology.
We’re pleased to announce that Rikki Ililonga and Musi-O-Tunya’s “Dark Sunrise” made it on to NPR’s “All Songs Considered” this afternoon. You can link to the program – and the song – below. A sample of the conversation shared by hosts Bob Bollen and Robin Hilton:
RH: You know so much about music, Bob…. I’m wondering, of all of the places you have mined for music – has your curiosity ever taken you to Zambian rock?
BB: I can’t think of one.
RH: I couldn’t have named one before this afternoon, when I started listening to this amazing collection of rock music from Zambia…. this producer named Egon discovered Rikki Ililonga’s music through a friend and made it his mission to get his music out there and, oh gosh, I’m so glad he did…
Link: Rikki Ililonga and Musi-O Tunya’s “Dark Sunrise” on NPR’s “All Songs Considered.”
