It's definitely a year of excellent recording projects at Glitterbeat. Buzz' Ayaz, Landless, Gordan, Ana Lua Caiano, Aziza Brahim, YĪN YĪN, BaBa ZuLa, Lucidvox and Lenhart Tapes are among the protagonists of a golden season for ethnic music, which recalls the fortunate period signed by Real World of Peter Gabriel. This time, however, the contamination of Western music does not take on importance: the perceptible contaminations are the result of an indigenous evolution of customs and in many cases are functional to the age of the musicians involved, an expression of a youth that wants to preserve tradition with a renewed spirit .
Yemeni trio who moved to Jaffa, El Khat are currently settled in Germany, but leader Eyal El Wahab has already declared that the band's nomadic life has found no respite. With solid studies in classical music and Jewish sacred music, El Wahab embarked on a career as a musician playing the cello in the Andalusian Orchestra, and then broadened his interest to less canonical and little-explored musical forms of popular music.
Now a skilled multi-instrumentalist, Eyal Eel Wahab has found in the percussionist Lotan Yaish and the organist Yefet Hasan the perfect accomplices for an artistic project which, starting from the wandering nature of the Arab Jews, hopes for a future in which peace and integration take over from oppression and cancellation of many cultural identities.
In this process of innovation of tradition, El Wahab has created artisanal tools by recycling waste materials and an ancient and almost tribal approach, with particular attention to those imperfections and flaws that belong to the real world, to everyday life.
“Mute” is a complex album, at times slightly difficult for those who hope to find themselves in the presence of ethnic nuances in a neo-missionary-leftist style. El Khat's third album is a desperate cry, an album in which darkness wins over the luminous sound staging; a collection of voices and strident sounds, even the noises captured from everyday life – plates and other kitchen utensils, woods, metals, plastics, and an instrument called a jug created by Eyal himself – are harsh, sharp, painful. The more traditional sound lines are deliberately unadorned, the almost pop shapes are irregular, the sound of the plucked strings and drums is heavy even when it stirs up joyful melodies (“Tislami Tislami”). Metaphors and celebration of feelings such as love, homeland and family are at the center of dizzying dances where the ignorance of politicians is mocked (“La WaLa”), while electronics calls everything into question with tantalizing reverberations which, in indicating ambition and experimentation , put ordinary stories and people at the center of music.
The psychedelic evolutions of the instrumental piece “Almania” (Germany in Arabic), and the riot of Arabic rhythms and sounds of “Intissar” are a further expression of a desire to confront each other while respecting one's identity without giving in to the dark charm of conflict. In this vivid contrast of ancient and modern, of struggle and antimilitarism, of cultural differences and universality of feelings, “Mute” stands out for its originality and depth. A record destined to survive the seduction of the political and social themes addressed thanks to the quality of the musical proposal, rich in inventiveness and fury, poetry and innovation.
02/10/2024
Daniel D`Amico for SANREMO.FM
