alec miller’s review of the albumMiriam Makeba

This album is basically African wedding songs with a few ‘standards’ thrown in (House of the Rising Sun, interestingly enough, for example). From what I can tell the big draw here is the fact that Miriam’s voice is beautiful and she uses the tongue clicking noises found in some African languages, which is honestly pretty unique and startling upon first hearing it (I was wondering if it were in fact a drum of some sort, but nope, it’s her!). One song does have the ‘weema way’ refrain that as later used on “The Lion Sleeps Tonight”. I have to assume that group heard the vocal rhythm here first and then replicated it for their own song to much acclaim. Bottom Line: It’s not all that interesting if an album to me. It really is traditional wedding songs, I just don’t see myself driving down the road to that.