Sunday, June 30, 2019

In Bright Yellow Pants





I can’t quite recall how I first came across Vaudou Game.  It may well have been I noticed it amidst a search of music of Benin.  The album covers are impossible to forget, with a bare-chested Peter Solo, in bright yellow pants and a West African bull mask on his head, they are at one and the same time playful, aggressive, traditional, retro, post-modern.  And the grooves are outstanding.  Immediately they channel the unmistakable classic 70’s sound of Orchestre Poly-rythmo de Cotonou.

“Pas Contente” is tremendously catchy and easy enough to follow with my fledgling French.  My younger one, the bright spot of whose report card interestingly enough was her French grade, did an interesting thing when I played the song for her.  Not only did she help me to realize what one of the lines was, she consented to letting me play it a second time.  At first I thought she was just humoring me, but as regular readers know, music sharing is serious stuff for us two and remarkably it seemed she now liked this funky West African gem.



Surprisingly there isn’t much up on the web about the Peter Solo, or the band.  He hails from neighboring Togo, which, along with Benin made up on the traditional Dahomey kingdom.  And where we are familiar with the Voodoo, which in Benin is referred to as Vodun, the Togolese refer to the sacred belief as Vaudou.  I managed to find a lengthy, substantive interview with Mssr. Solo where he comes across as articulate and immediately genuine.



I asked my daughter if she’d like to see the video for the song and . . . again, remarkably, she said “yes.”  Not because it was my turn but because she wanted to.  This particular video made a bit more sense after I knew these guys were based in Lyon.  Solo first brings an offering to the statue of a god.  Next one farmer and then another who are all, it would seem, French then bring the god wheat and eggs and fish.  And all the while Solo and the band are playing in this field and in my room, my daughter is singing along with the French. 



Thursday 6/27/19

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