V.A. : "Lagos Disco Inferno"
Voodoofunk/AcademyLPS V.A. : Lagos Disco Inferno -LP/CD- (NI,1970s)****'
This is the first time I review a "disco" record. I appreciate every genre that has musicality in its core but I usually associated disco with dancing itself, with a different appreciation, but I kept a distance intellectually so far, the same way I think a farmer should not start being engaged with city politics : the energy is of a too different form and experience to be mingled before the right angle is found. It is not bad to incorporate the groove element from a vision into musicality itself trying to analyse what is happening creatively what can be felt from a distance too, under the form of a review. The Afro-based elements in the Nigerian disco (if it is disco at all) make it also interesting to be experienced in different ways. Remember how early disco in the west, when it was merely a 7 inch expression, also had some roots in psychedelia, before it was more dominated by pop music and a certain commercial edge of support. For Nigeria disco was introduced into the war zone by Geraldo Pino through Ghana, importing funk as the new element to adapt. The experience of music thus was injected with new life with the formation of many bands that had something of disco in their legs. While trade economy re-established, the bands popped out of the ground like mushrooms. Influenced by western disco played by DJ's the Nigerian bands could only make their own versions of the style. Often there's more Afro-beat than any western disco, far less brass and much more psych with occasional elements from moog or organ, and even rock into its core, under influence of the new psych rock movement after the Biafra war. Of course, the element of funk is never too far away. From the listed tracks only a few tracks have the infantile lyrics about dancing itself like on Tirogo's “Dancing Machine”, what is more dominant is the looking for a creative new form of expression, without borders, so that even this track leans to other genres, through its jazzy solos..
I need to mention the amazing work of research record hunter Damian Iwuagwu has committed into it, when digging for the records, travelling from town to town, crawling from basement to basement. The collection surely is worth the effort. I hope it makes good money so that he will be able to re-release more and write a history from what until now was just 'past'. Although many records were printed at the time, several of them had been melted to make new ones, others were destroyed because the cassette was considered more practical. A fine well compiled collection which should interests psych-lovers too. Bands like Asiko Rock Group and Blo were for instance also included into the mix. And notice : last funky track by Nana Love, a female version of James Brown, is over 14 minutes long ! For everybody there's something in it.
