Consumer Guide Album

Kampire Presents: A Dancefloor in Ndola [Strut, 2024]
Hard to resist though these mostly woman-fronted late 20th century East African dance records are—at least as fetching as, for instance, the Shikamoo Jazz and Africa Negra comps I've kvelled about recently—it's distressing to learn that they hail from Uganda, one of the most arrantly homophobic nations in all of Africa and maybe even the world. Only how about that—it turns out Kampire, the Zambia-born albeit Ugandan by both heritage and current residence muso who compiled them is not only a woman but a gay woman and not only a gay woman but one who's made it a mission to combat all manifestations of sexism in her nation of origin. Topping the album's Spotify plays by plenty as it does, you can hear why "O Wine Tienge" isn't just the opener. But the music does keep on keeping on, I promise. A