Mdou Moctar

Mdou Moctar has been hailed as ‘the Hendrix of the Sahara’. And in his new album, Afrique

Victime, he channels the spirit of revolution – with a tremolo-picking technique that has to be heard to be believed...

On his extraordinary new record Afrique Victime, rising Tuareg star Mdou Moctar rails against the history of corruption and exploitation endured by the African continent and its people. The title track starts out as an urgent C minor vamp, its catchy

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major chorus sung in Moctar’s native Tamashek dialect. Then his sensational backing trio accelerate, pumping up the groove behind him, and Moctar heaves all his frustration into his Strat. The left-hander’s blistering playing takes off, his phasing, echoing, distorted solo a dizzying assault of string slides, bends and tremolo picking, of fast pentatonic runs abrasive atonal notes and frenzied feedback. It’s beautiful, exciting chaos, with the impressionistic charge and political spirit of, say, Jimi Hendrix’s Machine Gun.

“I approached that solo differently,” Moctar tells TG (our Tamashek’s a bit rusty so we’re doing this in French, via interpreter). “I didn’t innovate in a major way on it, but it’s supposed to be quite enraged. The track’s about revolution, so when you listen I want you to feel that rage a little bit. It’s my way of transmitting that message.”

Now 36, Moctar comes from Niger in West Africa.

As a boy he had to keep his musical ambitions secret from his strict Muslim family, who saw music as sinful. Out of necessity he made his own first guitar from a plank of wood; for strings he used filaments pulled from bicycle brake cables. He taught himself to play in the ‘takamba’ style

– a traditional Tuareg music characterised by hypnotically repetitious beats and melodic phrases. He learned his craft at local wedding and parties, and was on the way to wider fame when his poppy, autotuned single Tahoultine became a viral hit with the kids across his region, who shared it liberally via their cellphones.

He was 21 when he first laid his hands on an electric guitar, in 2006. “And it was a shock,” he says. “Before that

I was playing acoustic guitar, very softly, with just a couple of close friends hearing me. Then I had an electric guitar

in my hands, I touched that first string and it was roaring! Everybody could hear me, and I was terrified of making mistakes. The first piece I played was a bit tough, but everybody was encouraging me, and the second one it was easier. I kept practising, and realised it was better for solos. It’s found its place in my music.” These days he plays a Fender Stratocaster (strung with D’addarios, the bike cables long gone). He keeps a small batteryoperated amp for those gigs way, way off-grid out in the desert, but usually runs into a Roland Jazz Chorus 120 – sometimes a pair, coming out of his Boss DD-6 delay. His board also features a Boss OD-3 overdrive, two Earthquaker fuzz units – their ‘Hoof’ and ‘Bellows’ – and a phaser, usually an Electro-harmonix Bad Stone.

On Afrique Victime, the music ranges from the danceable electric grooves of Chismiten and Asdikte Akal to acoustic love songs such as Tala Tannam and Layla (no, not that one). “To be honest, I don’t even know what acoustic guitar that is,” he says with a laugh. “It’s not a particular brand or anything.”

While 2008 debut album Anar got his name out there, Moctar’s star rose in 2015 when he was cast in the Prince role in a Tuareg adaptation of the movie Purple Rain. He began playing further afield, across Europe, Canada and then, in 2018, the US. “It’s only after I started touring there that someone told me I was playing rock and blues,” he says. “I didn’t know those words before.”

Of course, the connections between the music of West Africa and the American South run deep. Another Tuareg band, Tinariwen, are perhaps the most famous exponents of the ‘desert blues’ scene, making a solid, WOMADfriendly link between the two traditions. That DNA ‘blues-print’ is amplified by Moctar’s playing too, notably his pentatonic scales, learned from watching local Nigerian players decades before being exposed to the music’s Western analogues.

When he did eventually hear Hendrix, just a few years ago, he was amazed by the parallels. “I think it’s crazy similar! The way Jimi played is very similar to some of the music at the root of Tuareg music, even more particularly to what Tinariwen plays. But that’s just one branch of Tuareg music. I’m heavily inspired by takamba, so I could play a track by Tinariwen, but you can tell that my solo’s going to be a bit different. A lot of the vibes might be similar, but it’s still different.”

Moctar usually straps a capo to his Strat, often on the 3rd fret (“The strings get closer to the fretboard, which really makes my job easier when I’m doing fast solos”), and his tremolo-picking technique has to be heard to be believed. Instead of a plectrum, he rapidly strokes the string with the tip of his pick-hand index finger, all the motion coming from the knuckle at the hand. “That’s something I learned entirely on my own – I really like the sound that it makes. I can play in a very fast way, and it really suits me. It was quite hard to learn it at first – my finger hurt and got tired after 30 seconds! Now I can do it more naturally, and do it up to an hour after practising a lot.”

All being well in September, Moctar is taking Afrique Victime on the road. “My main goal is to play in front of people who appreciate my music. Even if it’s only three guys, that’s fine. I’ve done a lot of concerts where people have gone home with joy and a smile on their face. That’s what fulfils me.”