Liberté
From Shawshara
| Liberté / ليبيرتاي | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
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| by Khaled | ||||
| Released | March 30, 2009 | |||
| Genre(s) | Rai | |||
| Label | AZ. | |||
| Producer | Martin Meissonnier | |||
Khaled chronology
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Liberté is Khaled's studio album released in 2009. The album goes back to the roots of Rai music.
[edit/عدّل] Track listing
- Hiya Ansadou (intro)
- Hiya Anasadou
- Raikoum (intro)
- Raikoum
- Ya Bouya Kirani
- Gnaoui
- Zabana
- Liberté (intro)
- Liberté (song)
- Soghri
- Sidi Rabbi
- Yamina (intro)
- Yamina
- Papa
- Sbabi Ntya
- Ya Mimoune (intro)
- Ya Mimoune
[edit/عدّل] Album Reviews
Khaled, the King of Rai, released his latest album Liberté after five years of silence. The album should have come with the warning label "The King is Dead Long Live the King". Ever since Khaled’s self titled album he successfully fused traditional Rai beats with pop, hip-hop, reggae and other world beats. This fusion brought Khaled to the international stage with hits such as Didi, Aïcha and Chebba. With every new album Khaled tweaked and tuned his music till it reached its epitome with his 1996 album Sahra. Ever since then while other Arabic musicians were able to keep their music relevant and up to date, Khaled failed to keep his music fresh. It seems that Khaled in his heart of hearts yearned for the more traditional Rai sounds of the early 80s, which meshed traditional Arabic instruments with electrical synthesizers. Liberté is Khaled’s biggest gamble. Liberté ditches the world fusion music that Khaled was known for and goes back to the traditional roots of not only Rai music but Arabic music too. I personally thought eight minutes long songs with a mawal intro are long dead, but apparently they live on in Liberté.
The bottom line is if you like Khaled for his world music fusion, then "the king is dead". On the other hand, if you like Khaled for his early 80s music then "long live the king".
The statement, "if you have to buy one Khaled album, make it 1984’s Hada Raykoum" is surely incontestable. It may well be that the same can now be said for the next best thing to that North African classic.
Hada Raykoum — by the-then Cheb Khaled — was one of the early internationally released African albums that hit an unsuspecting western listening world between the eyes, upturning its preconceptions about Arabic pop music for good. No respecter of traditions, the self-styled Rai King of Algeria couched his raunchy urban Oran style in swirling keyboards and electric guitar as well as the more usual sweeping string arrangements, poly-rhythms and accordion used in this gritty, thrusting genre from the busiest and most eclectic port in Algeria.
Since then, Khaled’s output has been regular and consistent and usually contains fine moments, although often (especially in the ’90s) getting bogged down in 'modern' production values such as soulless studio pre-programmed drums, an accent on keyboards at the expense of other instrumentation, and over-production of Khaled’s magnificent, soaring voice. Recent albums have seen a welcome move back to a more organic approach, and in Liberté at last we have a release to compete with that early ground-breaking Triple Earth release. Produced by long-standing colleague Martin Meissonnier, this album shivers and it snaps in funky, organic arrangements, with a real-live sweeping and stabbing string section (recorded in Cairo) that infuses the album with drama and depth. With it comes the return of melodramatic intro tracks in which Khaled unwinds a prelude to the song proper in undulating, pleading vocal tones, with keyboards, accordion, oud twisting and turning higher, ever higher around his voice, before breaking into dense and funky grooves. The Egyptian orchestra strings are the ever-present backdrop, alongside a mixed melange comprising elements of blasting horns, high-voiced backing, chattering percussion, violin, oud, electric guitar, ney flute and electric bass, all of it applied in judicious style in the clear and spacious arrangements.
Uptempo pop-rai is the core, but interest is also maintained by a handful of ballads (all of which avoid tipping over into cheesy bombast for a change) and a few old favourites — including a loose, poppy update on Raikoum itself, which features Rita Marley and friends on backing vocals — and one or two delves into the hypnotic gnawa grooves of Morocco. This is an album that can be recommended without reservation.
