In addition to Moctar on vocals and lead guitar, the band also includes rhythm guitarist Ahmoudou Madassane, drummer Souleymane Ibrahim, and American bassist and producer Mikey Coltun. Recorded locally in a rented house in 2022, Funeral for Justice is being hailed as Mdou Moctar’s most explosive album yet; more representative of the band’s live performances than their previous studio albums.
Fiery not only in the passionate music itself, the record is also charged lyrically, with the leader lashing out in his native Tamasheq language at the colonial history of Africa. Among Mdou Moctar’s most evangelic fans are Jack White and Metallica’s Kirk Hammett. “Us guitar players in the West, we all have the same base vocabulary, the same handful of stereotypical licks,” Hammett told the New York Times. “But Mdou’s music, it’s almost free of that stuff. And because of that, it sounds more spontaneous. It sounds fresh. It’s amazing.”
Mdou Moctar will perform at the Bearsville Theater in Bearsville on October 5 at 7pm. The Messthetics will open. Tickets are $34.65 and $53.15.
[event-1]