Description
Following the label’s acclaimed ‘Next Stop Soweto’ compilation series, Strut returns to the rich music heritage of South Africa for another landmark compilation celebrating the influential and heavily political music of drummer Julian Bahula since the mid-‘60s with the Malombo Jazz Makers, Jabula and Jazz Afrika bands. Bahula’s first group was the Malombo Jazzmen, led by guitarist Philip Tabane with flautist Abbey Cindi and they broke the mould, introducing indigenous malombo drums alongside guitar and flute to create a strong new cultural jazz fusion. In 1964, the group took the Castle Lager jazz festival by storm, South Africa’s biggest annual jazz event. Within a year, Bahula and Cindi had parted company with Tabane, and guitarist Lucky Ranku had come on board to form the Malombo Jazz Makers. By the end of the 1960s, they had established themselves as South Africa’s foremost afro-centric jazz group. In 1971, they made a clandestine tour of South Africa with Steve Biko and TECON (Theatre Council of Natal) Players, using music and theatre to promote black awareness and identity as part of Biko’s Black Consciousness message.
