The Best World Music CDs of 2011

Never ones to disappoint, Tuareg bluesmen Tinariwen hit us again with their gritty, hard-driving Saharan rock, complete with reverby electric guitars and keening, sometimes wailing, vocals. Tinariwen might just be the best band on this planet right now, and if you've missed their music so far, you're behind the times, friend. Catch up. Tassili, an acoustic-guitar based album (unlike their previous records, which primarily feature electric guitars) is as good a place as any to start. If some part of it doesn't resonate somewhere deep inside your musical soul, check your pulse.

Youngest son of Afrobeat pioneer Fela Kuti and, by extension, scion of one of West Africa's most important legacies, Seun Anikulapo Kuti has a lot on his shoulders. Meeting the challenge head-on, though, Seun has fronted his father's band Egypt 80 since the death of the elder when the younger was just 14. It's a role he was born to fulfill, though, and now, nearly a decade and a half later, he's fully blossomed in his own right. From Africa With Fury: Rise was produced by Brian Eno, John Reynolds, Godwin Logie, and Kuti himself, and it's a thunderous record from a young musician who has everything to prove. Hint: he proves it.

The Cote d'Ivoire-born and Mali-dwelling African reggae star Tiken Jah Fakoly recorded this powerful, anti-politricks record in Jamaica using a variety of traditional African instruments along with modern Western ones. It's roots reggae with global branches, and I, for one, am thrilled to have Fakoly on my radar.

The best world music, like the best wine and the best coffee, has a deeply developed terroir -- a multidimensional sense of place that shines through the music. That's not to say that fusion can't be great; indeed, sometimes it's a crucial player in the game, which is the case here. Dengue Fever's music, and Cannibal Courtship in particular, is deeply, deeply, L.A. Sound like an oxymoron? Maybe it isn't, at least not in this case. We've got elements of surf-rock, plus that grungy-but-sunshiney Southern California indie sound, with a substantial component of the music of a large immigrant group (in this case, vintage Cambodian pop music). Where could that specific combo happen but L.A.? The city and its sunny, edgy Pacific Rim vibe are a huge player here. Maybe it's not a coincidence that, like the city, Cannibal Courtship seems to elicit love-hate reactions. I'm on the side of love.

"Pull Together, Paddlers" is the English translation of the latest release from one of my favorite traditionalist trios in the world, Quebec's own Genticorum. This album revolves around a theme, travel, which encompasses both old North American French trader/trapper songs and songs about a quick trip around the dance floor, among others. The fiddle is the focus here, of course, but flute, bass, and guitar are also featured, and all lyrics are proudly en Français, bien sûr. Overall, it's a rousing and spirited record, a collection of honest traditional tunes and wry original compositions (and vice versa, in a couple of cases) -- this fast-rising group's best release to date.

Old and new, India and Africa, feminine and masculine: Aam Zameen not only finds common ground, but breaks new ground on the way. The spellbinding vocals of Indian classically-trained singer/songwriter/instrumentalist Kiran Ahluwalia are the focus here, but she's backed up by a host of great musicians, including members of African rockers Tinariwen, as well as her husband, Rez Abbasi, a jazz-world guitarist. Laying it out in words makes the whole thing seem like a sonic disaster just waiting to happen, but it really isn't -- in fact, quite the opposite! All elements bind together into something new and beautiful and wholly listenable.

Una y Otra Vez was the upbeat soundtrack to many of my summer roadtrips this year, and listening to it now, as I write this at the end of December, almost fools me into thinking it's warm outside. With his Pan-Atlantic sonic scope, with reggae, modern cumbia, salsa, and French hip-hop among just a few of the main musical influences, Sergent Garcia seems to almost be daring you not to dance to his music, and I assure you: you're more likely to pull a muscle trying to resist than you are just playing along.

Yasmin Levy's sultry treatment of traditional Ladino (Judeo-Spanish) music is totally accessible to most ears (thanks in part to an impeccable standard of production -- her recordings, including Sentir, are beautifully made and mastered), positioning her as a good candidate for becoming the next big-name world crossover act. Sentir is a fine example of Levy at her best: beguiling, richly emotive, and deeply satisfying -- a must-listen.

A quick note to non-North American readers: I realize that this CD was released in late 2009 in Europe; it was not released in North America until February of 2011, thus, its inclusion on the list.

Laru Beya translates to "on the beach" in Garifuna, the language of a tiny Caribbean/Central American minority whose ancestors were an intermingling of native people with the survivors of the wreck of a slave ship on the island of St. Vincent. Now spread along the Caribbean coast of Central America, the Garifuna are a people without a home, but who have retained both language and culture, including, of course, music. Aurelio is one of only a very few Garifuna musicians who anyone outside of the Central America is likely to have heard (the late Andy Palacio being one, and the women who make up Umalali being the others), and what a find he is! Laru Beya, his second album, highlights both the African and the Caribbean sides of the Afro-Caribbean coin, with enough modernism to keep it accessible and enough of a twist to make it all his own.

Fado Tradicional is short (36 minutes) and to-the-point CD from Portuguese fado star Mariza, who has been known for bringing outside influences into her fado sound, particularly Southeastern African traditions of Mozambique, the land of Mariza's birth and her mother's ancestral heritage. On this gorgeous little record, though, she goes back to the roots of the genre and delivers a plaintive set of classic fado songs of longing.

Note: this CD is another one that had an earlier release in Europe than in the U.S., where it was released in July of 2011.

Mali is known for its amazing musical exports, and among my favorites of those is guitar player Boubacar Traore. A bluesman, of sorts, keeping in mind that West African music came first, and a mighty instrumentalist, Traore, known as "Kar Kar" to his fans, is getting better with age. Well, perhaps not better, per se, but the blues (and its related and ancestral forms) is a genre that wears patina gracefully, and the dark and haunting Mali Denhou is certainly a fine example of that.