Artist: Amanaz
Album: Africa
Released: 1975
Quality: mp3 CBR 320
Size: 141 MB
“…on record, they sound like a band that wanted to ply their trade in heavy rock, folk-pop, and funk all at once-- but there's a rawness on this album that gives it a familiar garage-band appeal. Rhythms shift from minimalist plod-stomps one track to supple grooves the next; lead singer Keith Kabwe's voice sometimes stretches past his melodic range into an off-key flatness that would be more off-putting if it didn't sound so spontaneous, and it's all recorded with a muddy fidelity that, if reminiscent of bedroom tape culture, doesn't do the music any favors by turning what could've been a wall of guitar squall into a flimsy chain-link fence.
Not like much of that can be helped or even really matters, since Africa is one of those albums we should at least consider ourselves lucky to even get a chance to hear. Kabwe had retired to a life of farming by the time this album was proposed for reissue, and out of the other four band members, only guitarist Isaac Mpofu still survives. So hearing Kabwe wail, "Lemme tell you something new/ About the history of the man/ He's got nothing to lose," in "History of Man" resonates a bit more knowing just how little was saved from the Zam-rock scene for future posterity and how close to impermanence Amanaz's music actually came." - Nate Patrin, March 30, 2010
