Altsounds - Buraka Som Sistema - Black Diamond [Album]

With new musical genres springing from others every day of the week, Kuduro may well have passed you by. The legendary and recently defunct MTV2 120 Minutes show first brought it to my attention with Lisbon’s Buraka Som Sistema. Angolan born, the foursome of Lil' John, Riot, Conductor and Kalaf followed their native musical genre Kuduro over to Lisbon to help cement this new form of dance music in Europe, and they’ve been making waves ever since. They released their debut EP From Buraka to the World in Portugal, but up until the release of Black Diamond, their debut album, their only release in the UK was 12” “Yah”.

And indeed “Yah” features here too, along with 12 other tracks that merge Kuduro with techno, hip-hop, jungle and grime. The guestlist is longer than the Brit Awards’, with M.I.A., Saborosa, Puto Prata, DJ Znobia, Kano, Pongo Love, Bruno M and Deize Tigrona all adding their own ingredients to the potent brew. Add the fact that fellow artists from Diplo to Santogold enjoy championing the BSS crew and it’s clear that they have their fans in music world right now.

Black Diamond kicks off with “Oluanda Lisboa”, the first of many tracks to hint at influence from old school rave music and a fine introduction to the album, one which buzzes with constant activity; Buraka Som Sistema it seems do not do lethargy. Second track “Sound of Kuduro” brings the biggest gun out early doors, with MIA providing her unmistakable vocals to the ‘chorus’ of one of the album’s obvious potential singles. Another, “Kalemba (Wegue Wegue)”, bets its house on you shaking your derrieire, and with good reason – it’s literally impossible not to (tests prove it). The album’s midriff is stronger still, with“Kurum”, “IC19” (‘Experience’-era Prodigy abound) and album highlight “General” cementing the consistency demonstrated so far. The opening to “Skank & Move”, the only track featuring predominantly English lyrics, is awesome. Ironically enough this intro is African tribal chanting; the English rhymes provided by British Grime artist Kano actually weaken the track. Although the album being almost entirely Portuguese may mean Buraka Som Sistema’s political messages are lost on the majority of the world, it does allow the vocals to feature more as an instrument, supplementing the music rather than distracting from it.

The album closes with the hard techno of “New Africas, Pt 2” preceded by the hypnotic “New Africas, Pt 1”; a contrast of sounds that belies the kinship their titles suggest. And indeed despite the kinship the album shares with many of the genres it draws from, it’s quite like nothing you have ever heard before. As M.I.A herself says – it’s “the sound of Kuduro coming at your door”.

Track List:

Oluanda Lisboa
Sound of Kuduro
Aqui Para Voces
Kalemba (Wegue Wegue)
Kurum
IC19
Tiroza
General
Yah
Skank & Move
D..D..D..D..Jay
New Africas, Pt 1
New Africas, Pt 2