Rikki Ililonga and Musi-O-Tunya

Zamrock Archival Reissues

You’re probably a regular visitor to this site, so you probably already have our Dark Sunrise and We Intend To Cause Havoc! vinyl box sets. But, if you don’t, we have some bad news – we sold out. And we’re not making any more. That means, if you can’t find one at you local record store, or on your favorite online repository, you’re going to be stuck trawling eBay so you can get all of your Musi-O-Tunya, Rikki Ililonga, and WITCH fuzz-funk with detailed booklets packaged in handsome boxes and slipcases.

But fret not – we’ve made the most popular of the single LPs available in just that – single LP formats. No booklets, no download cards – just the straight archival issues of these Zamrock gems. These too are rather limited in supply. So if you want this Zambian music (re)packaged in its original format, you should get it now – after these sell out, it’s CD and digital only.

Zamrock at Transmusicales Festival/Rennes, France

As detailed in yesterday’s issue of Le Monde (“Can You Dance The Zamrock” by Stephanie Binet), WITCH’s “Jagari” Chanda and Rikki Ililonga are on their way to Rennes, France to perform an exclusive set of their Zamrock classics at Jean-Louis Brossard’s Transmuicales Festival. They will be backed by Karl Hector & The Malcouns. This is the first Zamrock performance outside of Zambia in over thirty-five years.

Above and below you can see some images shot by South African filmmaker Calum MacNaughton, who was with Chanda and Ililonga filming scenes for a forthcoming Zamrock documentary when he snapped these shots of the duo in rehearsal. More photos to come soon.

A special thanks to Ludivine Gretere for making this event possible.

“Dark Sunrise” in NY Times “Year’s Most Notable Box Sets And Reissues.”

What does Zamrock godfather Rikki Ililonga have in common with Jimi Hendrix and the Rolling Stones? His Dark Sunrise anthology is side-by-side box sets dedicated to those greats in the New York Times’ wrap-up of the best box sets and reissues of 2010. An excerpt from Jon Pareles’ review:

“Welcome to Zamrock, the psychedelic funk made in Zambia in the mid-1970s. “Dark Sunrise” collects music from the guitarist Rikki Ililonga: one disc from his band Musi-O-Tunya, a second from his own solo career. Musi-O-Tunya’s Zamrock is late-60s San Francisco gone to Africa, with wah-wah rhythm facing Afrobeat horns and percussion and soul-rock 4/4 trading off with six-beat African rhythms. Although it’s African rock, many of the songs are in English, Zambia’s constitutional language. Then Mr. Ililonga went solo, playing most of the instruments himself, and turning to a loose, woozy African spinoff of the Velvet Underground, folk-rock and garage-rock that still didn’t stint on the fuzz-tone. “I’m drowning in this crazy sensation,” Mr. Ililonga sings, appropriately.”

This Weekend in L.A.: Our official “Dark Sunrise” Record Release Party at Palate Food + Wine

We’re throwing another free event to celebrate the release of our Dark Sunrise anthology. Well, let’s clarify: entry is free, the sounds are free; you have to buy your own vino and food… We’ll be playing Zamrock all afternoon (and probably evening) and the Palate folks – added again to Pulitzer Prize winning food critic Jonathan Gold’s “99 Essential LA Restaurants” list in the LA Weekly – will be dishing out some Zambian staples.

In case you missed out on our Sunday best(es) before:

Pictures from our Weird Jazz Afternoon which we threw for our P.E Hewitt Winter Winds The Complete Works release.
Pictures from our Black Man’s Cry record release party.