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Dusted Features
Every Friday, Dusted Magazine publishes a series of music-related lists determined by our favorite artists. This week: African guitar prodigy Bombino and Holy Fuck’s Brian Borcherdt, who selected a very familiar name for his side project.
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Listed: Bombino + Dusted
Bombino
The Tuareg guitarist Omara "Bombino" Moctar made his first impression on Stateside audiences with Guitar Music From Agadez, released by Sublime Frequencies in 2007. While the music heard there featured a full band and tended towards the amplified and ecstatic. That album also featured his acoustic guitar work, which was more prominent on last year’s Agadez. That album tended towards a more folk-influenced sound, and a Richard Thompson influence could be detected at times.
1. Ali Farka Touré - Niafunké
This is my favorite Ali Farka Touré album. Ali’s style of playing has always been a major influence on me. He is also a role model for the way he conducted himself in his career, always staying true to his roots and to his people. Even becoming mayor of his hometown! He is the true king of Saharan blues.
2. Dire Straits - Love Over Gold
When I was first playing guitar, this was a very important album for me. I love Mark Knopfler’s style and I would try to mimic it as I was learning the guitar. We would listen on our little radios in Tamanrasset, Algeria when I was there with my family when the first Tuareg rebellion in Niger forced us to leave Agadez. So this album will always have a special significance to me.
3. Jimi Hendrix - Electric LadylandJimi is a God of the guitar. Everyone knows that. There will never be another guitarist like him. He was a big inspiration to me when I was young and he remains one today. The way his guitar dances over the rhythm section is magic. Watching videos of him growing up gave me a powerful desire to one day perform like him.
4. Santana - Abraxas
One of the best albums ever recorded. I think of all Western guitarists, my style is most similar to Santana. His sound was somehow very familiar to me even though I never knew where he was from or what was behind his music. It felt like home. He has been a major influence on my playing all along.
5. Tinariwen - Amassakoul
Ibrahim of Tinariwen is probably my biggest single musical hero. What Tinariwen has done for Tuareg musicians is simply incredible. They were the first to break out into the world and show the younger generation that anything is possible if you are dedicated to your music and your culture. They inspired all Tuareg people. Being mentioned as an important Tuareg artist alongside them is an honor that makes me shiver. They will always be No. 1 for me.
6. Abdallah ag Oumbadougou - Desert Rebel
This album is not very well-known outside of Africa but it is one of the best that has ever come from our region. What a funky album! Abdallah was also a pioneer in showing younger Tuareg musicians that our music can be put together with other styles and made more accessible to people outside of Africa. He is another big hero for me.
7. Pink Floyd - Dark Side Of The Moon
Many people tell me that my music is psychedelic -- I did not know what they were talking about. I needed to have it explained to me. When I understood what they meant I thought to myself, "OK, maybe this is because I listened to Pink Floyd growing up." So this classic album must be a part of where my music came from. I will say I discovered psychedelic music through them and Jimi Hendrix.
8. The Black Keys - Brothers
I discovered the Black Keys more recently then the rest. I love their music. It has a very strong personal feeling, like you are in the same room as them when you are listening. It is a brilliant mix of intimacy and raw rock-’n’-roll. Everyone who loves rock has to know this album.
9. Baaba Maal
I love all of his music. He is my favorite male singer from Africa. His voice is sand and honey at once. Incredible!
10. Oumou Sangaré
She is my favorite female singer from Africa. She makes the hairs on my neck stand up in respect when she sings. A true songbird. She is also someone everyone must hear.
Dusted
We’d be completely remiss to not feature an artist whose most recent side project is titled Dusted. As one half of the aforementioned band Dusted, and a member of the Toronto band Holy Fuck, Brian Borcherdt has managed to make quite a name for himself, earning fandom from luminaries such as Lou Reed and Thom Yorke. Total Dust, the new album from Dusted, is a pretty far departure from Borcherdts work with his profanely named other endeavor. Where Holy Fuck creates slick electronic-tinged dance tracks, Dusted goes the other direction into the realm of fuzzed-out music for loners. Total Dust dropped July 10 on Polyvinyl.
1. Sonic Youth - Evol
I like that this record is eerie, weird and super cool, as every high school crush should be.
2. Toru Takemitsu - Film Music Of…
He created beautiful, haunting, music that felt strangely alive (sort of growing and mossy and wispy). I’ve yet to absorb it in context to the film’s for which it was written. Hopefully I will someday.
3. Neil Young - Harvest
My mom’s records are timeless to me—literally. These sounds were older than dirt as far as my infant brain was concerned. Therefore nothing makes me all teary eyed like early Zeppelin records, Neil Young and Joni Mitchell. They sound like birdcalls and wind.
4. Black Sabbath - Master Of Reality
I was scared of my brother’s heavy metal records... or so I pretended. He saw through it and bought me this cassette for my birthday. It became my favorite lawn mowing music.
5. Can - Ege Bamyasi
I think they were trying to make James Brown kind of records.
6. Metallica - Ride The Lightning
I haven’t seen Some Kind of Monster, not out of fear that it would forever taint my image of these guys. I don’t need a movie to do that. I know they suck now. This album is awesome.
7. Arthur Russell - Calling Out Of Context
I heard he wanted to combine ‘avante’ or high-brow and modern pop. He definitely combined hugging and dancing.
8. Soundgarden - Louder Than Love
I’m not going to deny it, though these guys didn’t age well (on account of them making shitty records), owning an album like this in a pre-"Smells Like Teen Spirit" small-town, which for me was Yarmouth, Nova Scotia, got you picked on and nearly beat up. However it did make you cool to other picked-on weirdos. This was some outlandish witchy music.
9. Various Artists - BIPP
This compilation will nicely achieve the affect of cramming a whole bunch of cool bands with cool ideas on this otherwise short list.
10. Codeine - The White Birch
Just when nu metal made heavy music really un-heavy by crying and throwing tantrums, bands like this reminded us what real heaviness sounded like, slow and looming, threatening to crush.
By Dusted Magazine
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