I need to have this LP asap! So, so good.
With the attack (of Hargeisa) imminent, a few brave radio operators and dedicated vanguards of Somali culture knew the archives, containing over half a century of Somali music had to be preserved. Thousands upon thousands of cassette tapes and master reels were quickly removed from the soon-to-be targeted buildings. They were dispersed to neighboring countries like Djibouti and Ethiopia, and buried deep under the ground to withstand even the most powerful airstrikes.
These audio artifacts were excavated and recalled from their foreign shelters only very recently. Some of those recordings are now kept safe in the 10,000-strong cassette tape archive of the Red Sea Foundation, the largest collection of Somali cassettes in the world, in Somaliland’s capital, Hargeisa. The Ostinato Records team digitized a large portion of the archive, distilling 15 songs that reveal the panoramic diversity of styles and sophistication of Somali musicianship.
Over a millennia of trade in the Indian Ocean invited the cultures of the Arabian Peninsula, Persia, India, Southeast Asia, and even China to slowly work their melodies, scales, and sounds into Somalia’s rich musical repertoire. Each track is a keen illustration of a carefully refined, rarely revealed cultural crossroads of the world.
The archive offered a living window to the Mogadishu of the 1970s and 1980s, when the coastal capital glistened as the “Pearl of the Indian Ocean." With its iconic ivory-colored architecture and crescent beaches overlooking the Indian Ocean, Mogadishu was home to the lavish Al Uruba and Jazira sea side hotels, where youthful bands like Iftiin, Sharero, and Dur Dur serenaded cosmopolitan crowds at some of the most elegant nightclubs in East Africa. These damaged cassettes evoked memories of the revered national theater, where Waaberi Band provided unforgettable soundtracks.
"This record is a miracle. A legacy of the past that blurs the trauma of the present."
"Perhaps the most beautiful music in the world, finally rediscovered."
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