Balka Sound

• Balka Sound [Strut, 2022] A-

Consumer Guide Reviews:

Balka Sound [Strut, 2022]
Based across the river from teeming Belgian Congo Kinshasa in less fraught French Congo Brazzaville, hence not directly under the thumb of the tyrant Mobutu, Balka Sound gathered around Albert Nkibi, adept of a rural five-stringed lute called the ngonfi. Their jaunty, amiable, relatively abrupt rhythms rock as much as they roll, barely hinting at the rippling escapist uplift of Zairean soukous but generating plenty of bustle to take its place. These 15 tracks average over five minutes, taking on occasional saxophone as they proceed from the early '80s to June 1997, when the band's studio was looted in one of the military flare-ups that wouldn't peter out until the new century was in place. A-