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Album review


Franco: the sound of rumba

Very best of


Paris 

16/07/2007 - 

Rumba star Franco is one of Congo’s most influential and political artists. A two-CD release from the Classic Titles collection, offering nearly two-and-a-half hours of music, showcases the lengthy career of the man nicknamed the "African Balzac".

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Franco's discography, over a career of a little over three decades until his death in 1989, reflects his phenomenal work rate and features around a hundred albums. Faced with such a huge œuvre, creating a truly representative compilation is even more problematic than it would be for most other artists.

Hardcore fans of François Makiadi Luambo (Franco's real name) might well wince at this volume of Classic Titles being labelled the “very best of”, a title which smacks more a sales gimmick than a real reflection of the contents of this album. Nonetheless, its 23 tracks do give a solid overview of this singer and guitarist's career, from his beginnings to the end but also in terms of his musical development. From La Rumba OK, recorded in 1955 while he was starting out in the cabarets of Leopoldville, to Mario, recorded in Brussels in 1986, each track on this album illustrates a moment in the musical career of this leader of the OK Jazz band and later the TPOK Jazz. A booklet of sleeve notes puts each of these tracks into the historical context of the times, introducing the myriad other artists involved in their creation, such as Franco's early partner Vicky Longomba who you can hear on Tomesani Zonga Coco; Sam Mangwana – originally from rival band Afrisa International de Tabou Ley Rochereau – on Alimatou, or guitarist Simaro Lutumba who wrote Fifi Nazali Innocent. In this hothouse atmosphere of intense creativity, standard song formats are often thrown out the window. Some tracks, such as Très impoli, clock in at a quarter of an hour or more, while others don't even make three minutes. Recording quality is equally variable, and you can sometimes hear crackles or feedback, particularly with the vocals. But these flaws demonstrate the authentic, spontaneous nature of this music wrought with the repetitive grooves of this unique guitar sound.

Franco Collection Classic Titles (2CD) (Cantos/Pias) 2007

Bertrand  Lavaine

Translation : Julie  Street