In the Tamasheq language of the Tuareg people, the word ‘assouf’ suggests a feeling of homesick longing and nostalgia. It’s an emotional state that permeates every moment of Tamikrest’s sixth album. While themes of nomadic exile and displacement have run through the Saharan band’s work since their formation in 2006, vocalist Ousmane Ag Mossa bitterly observes that the situation is worsening. Mali has been governed by a military junta since 2021, though a new separatist insurgency began in April. It’s little wonder Ag Mossa’s voice conveys a world-weary, melancholy yearning.
And yet Tamikrest prize great beauty out of this dire reality. That in itself feels like an act of indefatigable defiance. Acoustic and electric guitars weave timeless, twinkling spells around Ag Mossa’s vocals, driven on doggedly by drum kit and plodding hand percussion. Cheikh Ag Tiglia’s lithe bass guitar drops into gorgeously expressive loping grooves while Paul Salvagnac’s lapsteel guitar adds whispy embellishments. The album was recorded live in a Netherlands studio, using a vintage analogue 16-track tape machine, and it glistens with an undeniably psychedelic sheen. Much of it sounds like it could have emanated from a hippie fireside jam in Laurel Canyon.
