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Tunis Tapes

17/01/2019Brighton's Hive Mind Records Shares Vintage Tunisian Cassette Mix
 

Brighton is probably not the first place you'd suspect to be behind a mix of vintage Tunisian cassettes. The so-called London-by-the-sea is however home to Hive Mind Records, a quality imprint specialising in "vintage and contemporary sounds from around the globe". Credit them for posthumously releasing an 8-track vinyl album of the late Maalem Mahmoud Gania's final studio recordings as well as a 30-minute cassette tribute to fellow Moroccan legend Moulay Ahmed El Hassani

To close out the year and keep our ears perked, Hive Mind decided to drop a one-hour tape mix on December 31st via their Bandcamp page, containing dusty pop and folk sounds from Tunisia. The description reads: "From raw traditional folk songs, featuring the head-spinning sound of the zukrah (an oboe like reed instrument also known as the ghaita or rhaita) and the bendir and darbouka hand drums, to more modern sounds that blend synths and drum machines with the more traditional instruments, this mix is guaranteed to blow the cobwebs from your mind."

Well it did, to say the least. The Tunis Tape Mix obviously comes equipped with a Side One and a Side Two. Both are available as a free download. The only thing missing is a tracklist. And though the first minutes were hard to stomach, these distant sounds started to grow on us. That is until the zukrah returned in full effect. But hey, we asked for it. Happy New Ear everyone!

AUTHOR: Lev Nordstrom