Album: Franco / Francophonic

Artist: Franco

Title: Francophonic

Although Xgau isn't a very reliable guide to rock'n'roll these days, he is still pretty dependable on African music. So, despite the fact that his 2008 Dean's list contains at least three outright stinkers in his top ten, I did take take a chance on his number one entry, this two-disc career overview of Congolese music hero Franco. For whatever reason, I was not at all familiar with his work, so this was an excellent introduction.

Selecting from music recorded over a three-decade span, it induces a slight feeling of vertigo to get swept up into such a deep pool, feeling the sorcerer invent whole new musical dialects. Starting with a rhumba-fied sort of Latin sound, the music expands outward in all directions, but never losing touch the rhythm. There's also some amazing guitar playing throughout (I'm currently totally knocked over by 1973's "Minuit eleki Lezi").

I picked this up at Soundscapes for a very reasonable price — highly recommended.