Best of The Beat on Afropop: Africa 101--A Tour of African Music

Best of The Beat June 11, 2016

For those Afropop readers who may be just getting into African music, or for a refresher course on the history and varieties of the continent’s popular music, here’s a helpful overview circa 1984 by The Beat’s Jack Kolkmeyer, then a D.J. on KLSK-Santa Fe, when much of this music was newly reaching an international audience. <a href="https://afropop.test.ejaedesign.com/migrated-uploads/2016/06/Beat36TourP9.jpg"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignleft wp-image-29633 size-large" src="https://afropop.test.ejaedesign.com/migrated-uploads/2016/06/Beat36TourP9-1024x587.jpg" alt="Beat3#6TourP9" height="367" width="640"></a>It’s a snapshot of the era when now-legendary artists like King Sunny Ade, Fela Kuti, Tabu Ley Rochereau, Manu Dibango, Mahotella Queens and Thomas Mapfumo were just reaching American ears in a bewildering deluge of styles, nations and genres, with the adventurous pre-Internet cooperation of radio programs, club D.J.s, concert presenters, labels and record shops. We're talking vinyl and cassettes, folks! It was an exciting time, as new discoveries seemingly surfaced on a weekly basis, the beginning of the tidal wave of music from the African continent and diaspora we never imagined would come.<a href="https://afropop.test.ejaedesign.com/migrated-uploads/2016/06/Beat36BetterRecords.jpg"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignright wp-image-29635 size-medium" src="https://afropop.test.ejaedesign.com/migrated-uploads/2016/06/Beat36BetterRecords-201x300.jpg" alt="Beat3#6BetterRecords" height="300" width="201"></a> <a href="https://afropop.test.ejaedesign.com/migrated-uploads/2015/11/Beat36cover.jpg"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignleft wp-image-26287 size-medium" src="https://afropop.test.ejaedesign.com/migrated-uploads/2015/11/Beat36cover-231x300.jpg" alt="Beat3#6cover" height="300" width="231"></a> The Beat was just getting its sea legs on African music as well, after its birth in 1982 as a reggae-centric publication, and this issue, Vol. 3#4, with the Fela Kuti cover and extensive African music content, became a prototype for the next 25 years of its brilliantly diverse coverage to follow. READ OR DOWNLOAD PDF <a href="https://afropop.test.ejaedesign.com/migrated-uploads/2016/06/Beat36Tour.pdf">Beat3#6Tour</a> <a href="https://afropop.test.ejaedesign.com/migrated-uploads/2016/06/OliverMtukudzi.jpg"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="wp-image-29640 size-thumbnail alignleft" src="https://afropop.test.ejaedesign.com/migrated-uploads/2016/06/OliverMtukudzi-150x150.jpg" alt="OliverMtukudzi" height="150" width="150"></a> The website <a href="http://www.awesometapes.com/category/80s/" target="_blank">Awesome Tapes From Africa</a> offers a taste of the African artists we were listening to the '80s, some still famous today, and some who have dropped off the radar. It's a glimpse of where we were when this "Tour of African Music" was published. It's a fun site; you can stream and enjoy the cassette tracks. By the way, Jack Kolkmeyer is still radioactive, with a program on <a href="http://www.fifthwallradio.com/" target="_blank">Fifth Wall Radio</a> called "Brave New World." <a href="https://afropop.test.ejaedesign.com/25929/the-beat-goes-on-intro/" target="_blank">ABOUT BEST OF THE BEAT ON AFROPOP</a>