AMANAZ

Ok -- so the blurb that can be found everywhere taped to the record "Africa" by Zambian group Amanaz claims, "goes in the same direction as Blo, The Witch and Question Mark, but this album is way cooler and stoned with amazing fuzz guitar all over which sounds like an African version of early Cream."

I haven't heard Blo, and just located a copy of the "Be Nice To The People" LP by Question Mark, but the album "Lazy Bones!!" by Witch has held a very high place for me in the past year or so. Needless to say, I wanted to see what all the boasting was about...

This record has been on repeat for days now, insidiously getting better and better each time. Feels like being transported softly to a warm place, perhaps with tall leafy trees swaying ... in the meantime a fat snowstorm is falling outside my window. Yes -- I like this!



The band was formed in 1973 by ex-members of Clasters, Black Souls, MacBeth and Wrong Number-- the result was the album "Africa," recorded in the city of Kitwe, in northern Zambia.

The songs on this record live somewhere between 70s fuzz guitar, delicate Zambian drums, and some other unearthly influence... 9 of them are in English (including a sweet song repeating "Khala my friend, the world is full of misery, and the road you're taking has no end, Khala my friend, come back to me, Khala my friend, cause I'm going to miss you...") and 3 are sung in the Bantu language Bemba ("Nsunka Lwendo," "Africa," and "Kale.")

Here are a few tracks, though it was hard not to put up all of them:

Amanaz - Green Apple
Amanaz - History of the Man
Amanaz - Easy Street
Amanaz - Sunday Morning
Amanaz - Africa