History

On their third album, Bokanté have plugged into the blues, tracing the genre’s roots in West Africa and the Arab world through the diaspora into the retro-modern present. These nine tracks tell — with lyrics sung mainly in Guadeloupean Creole — of outsiders and seers, memories and joy; of black history, global unity and the futility of war. Of taking time to rest, feel, love. Of the redemptive power of music — as a conduit, a change maker, a muse.

History finds Bokanté exploring further, dressing folkloric instruments including the Arabic oud, West African ngoni and North African guembri, the bass lute favoured by Morocco’s Gnawa maalems, in western clothes.