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October 3, 2020:

Tusk Festival: Moulay Ahmed Elhassani: Electric Roots From Morocco



Listen to this show:  Pop-up player!

Moulay Ahmed Elhassani is a prolific Moroccan artist doing things his own way: Recording at home and playing every instrument! His fifty-plus albums released in Morocco feature original songs blending traditional and modern styles. Hive Mind Records released his first international album, Atlas Electric , in 2018.

We hear Ahmed as part of WFMU's collaboration with the adventurous Tusk festival - usually held in Newcastle UK but this year online and on WFMU.



Above: A video clip of Ahmed warming up for his Tusk Festival performance (apologies, the aspect ratio is a little off). Here's more on Moulay Ahmed Elhassani (from https://tuskfestival.com/artists/moulay-ahmed-elhassani/):

Though he’s released over 50 albums on cassette in his home country of Morocco, Ahmed is barely known at all outside his home country. Running the show in true DIY style, he plays and records all parts of his music (with occasional guest vocalists) at home and releasing mostly through his own label Sawt El Hassani.

The sound he has created spans the generations, blending the folk music of the Amazigh (Berber) people with chaabi and rai and realizing the result with synths, autotune and psychedelic microtonal guitar playing. Its a baked and dreamy sound that he’s created, female vocals and reverb adding a seductive heat-haze shimmer.

Thanks to our friends at Hive Mind Records, Moulay Ahmed Elhassani is now finding a new audience outside Morocco and hopes to make his first appearances on the European festival circuit next year (would’ve been this year but, you know..). Hive Mind put together a collection of his standout recordings for the album Atlas Electric, which has been well received over here, especially at TUSK HQ. We’re excited to give him some more international exposure and we think you might just love his ancient/modern tales of love and loss too.

WFMU and WFMU's Transpacific Sound Paradise denounce explicit and implicit racism; condemn the culture of white supremacy, which enables the brutalization of black people and other communities of color, and support Black Lives Matter and the movement it stands for.

Here's a link to WFMU's Public Service page with links and info for / related to racial justice issues, coronavirus testing, food and economic assistance, musician aid, voting rights organizations and lots more: https://wfmu.org/psa/.

Also: BRIC has an extensive and regularly updated pandemic crisis resource list on its website with artists, performers etc. in mind but relevant for everyone. See it here: https://www.bricartsmedia.org/blog/resources-artists-during-public-health-crisis.

For a list, with links, of organizations supporting the rights of immigrants and refugees. click here.

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Check out the Transpacific Sound Paradise All-Time African Music Faves Spotify Playlist at http://tiny.cc/tsp-africa. Here's a live performance of one of the gems that's also on our playlist:



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