Rough Guide to Congolese Soukous

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Editorial reviews

Album Description
Congolese music - rumba or soukous - has been at the core of African dance music for almost half a century, surpassing just about every other African pop style in existence. The Rough Guide To Congolese Soukous profiles the sweet guitar sound and hip-swinging rhythms of this superb dance rhythm, featuring tracks from some of Africa's greatest stars.

Artists include: Franco & Sam Mangwana, Pepe Kalle & Rigo Star, Kanda Bongo Man, Nouvelle Generation, Koffi Olomide, Rocherau and Zaiko Langa Langa

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Customer reviews

review by: date: 2008-09-17 rating:
An excellent overview of Soukous Music
If you are looking for an introduction to Soukous music this may be a good first album for you. There are selections from several of the innovators of this musical genre including Kanda Bongo Man and Pepe Kalle. The CD also comes with a booklet that gives you a bit of background information on the various artists included in this compilation.

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review by: date: 2007-05-08 rating:
Soukous are fun, intricate, and happy music
Our world of music can be so homoginized in the USA. It seems that the FM radio stations push on us all this stuff that comes mainly from very few locations around the globe. We hear the music basically that the major record promoters want us to buy on the commercial FM dial. There is great music all over the world and we can get to hear and experience only a small fraction of it, unless we make the effort to look elsewhere.

I got exposed to the music of Africa and Soukous through a public (listener sponsored) FM radio staion here in the San Francisco Bay Area. And have experienced some of this wonderful music live tool. That radio staion is KKUP. The music of Africa, in particular Soukous is a joyous and rich musical form. Currently I have a small collection of this music. This CD, Rough Guide to Congolese Soukous, is a great starting point. This music should put a smile on your face if you are open to multi-cultural music, and music that comes from places elsewhere around the world.

I was looking particularly for this music and this CD is a bulls-eye.

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review by: thephantom75 date: 2003-05-14 rating:
Spectacular!
I love soukous and this is one of my favorite soukous albums. It has great songs from all the best-known soukous artists. Soukous shares the same shuffling, stacato backbeat as Cuban rhumba, but also features glittering, cascading guitars that are very impressive. In addition to this, the horns and the vibrant vocals (which are usually sung in Portuguese, French, Lingala, English or all of the above!), make soukous irresistable! This album not only has great songs, from great artist, but the sound quality is great and the liner notes are very informative! Truly beautiful music! Worth every penny; Buy it!

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review by: date: 2003-04-16 rating:
Big Al's review
This cd definately offers a very nice variaty of songs of the Democratic Republic Congo, the former Zaïre. All artists are well known and very succesful for years. Some of them performed in Africa, Europe, U.S. and even Japan.

There is only one little downside though: half the songs kan be found on other cd's with various artists. So .... check before you buy!


review by: date: 2002-03-05 rating:
Soukous from the Heart of Darkness!
Explaining Soukous is hard. Soukous are a style of African music, based off Rumba, that originated in the Congo and spread out across the rest of the continent. After hearing this CD, a wonderful compilation from the Rough Guides, you will definately understand why Soukous were popular enough to spread across Africa! This CD gives a great overview of Soukous, focusing on selections from the Congo.
All the music on this CD is dancey and upbeat, like Soukous should be. Several big names, including Franco, Sam Mangwana, Koffi Olomide and Papa Wemba appear on this CD, giving classical performances. Indeed, I'd say that "Cooperation" is easily one of the most popular Soukous of all time. Old and new appear side by side on this CD. If you are unfamilar with Soukous, or even the music of the Congo in general, you should consider buying this CD. Its a magnificent introduction to Soukous. And even if you don't speak Lingala, you will find yourself addicted to this music.

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Similar categories

Music . Styles . World Music . General
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