Colours of the Night

Colours of the Night is an album by Moroccan Gnawa musician Maalem Mahmoud Gania. It was recorded in 2013 at Studio Plein Les Oreilles in Casablanca, Morocco, and was initially released on CD for distribution within Morocco before being issued as a double LP in 2017 by Hive Mind Records as the label's first release. The album was Gania's final studio recording before his death in 2015.[1][2][3][4]

Colours of the Night
Studio album by
Maalem Mahmoud Gania
ReleasedSeptember 8, 2017
Recorded2013
StudioStudio Plein Les Oreilles, Casablanca, Morocco
GenreGnawa, Folk music, World music
LabelHive Mind Records
HMRLP001

Reception
Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
The Attic[4]
The Vinyl Voice[5]
The Hum[6]

In a review for The Attic, Dragoș Rusu wrote: "This is deeply hypnotic trance music... this is considered healing music, evoking ancestral saints who can drive out evil, cure psychological harms or cure scorpion bites... [it] transports the listener into a magical land, a beautifully crafted landscape."[4]

Harrison Murray of The Vinyl Voice stated: "This is sacred music that one must give oneself up to, inward, even guarded, rather than bursting out through the speakers and trying to sweep the listener off their feet in a wave of compulsory awe... It is an album of fine details, subdued gestures, and delicate, haunting beauty, sharing common elements with Western Afro-diasporic music, but through an entirely different cultural frame."[5]

Writing for Monolith Cocktail, Dominic Valvona commented: "Gania's playing style is raw, deep and always infectious: from blistering solos to slower and lighter ruminating descriptive articulations; this is equally matched by his atavistic soulful voice and the chorus of swooning, venerated female and male voices and harmonies that join him on each track... As inaugural releases go, this one is definitely a winner."[7]

The Hum's Bradford Bailey remarked: "Absolutely stunning and engrossing on every count, it's Gnawa music at its absolute best. The fact that it represents the last time this master's voice will appear, is heart-wrenching and made that much more tragic by its towering heights. It is a perfect capsule of nearly everything I love about music. If its hypnotic rhythms, call and response vocals, and rippling tones don't make your body heave and sway, you're probably dead."[6]

The Wire included the album in their "Top 50 Releases of 2017."[8][9]

Track listing

Side A
  1. "Sadati Houma El Bouhala" – 8:59
  2. "Shaba Kouria" – 8:51

Side B
  1. "Bala Matinba" – 11:00
  2. "Amara Mousseye" – 8:16

Side C
  1. "Foulani" – 9:42
  2. "Sidi Sma Ya Boulandi" – 8:06

Side D
  1. "Ba Yourki" – 8:04
  2. "Mrahba Baba Hamouda" – 7:48

Personnel

with

  • Karima El Filali
  • Asmae Hazmaoui
  • Chaimae Lofti
  • Hazma Gania
  • Houssam Gania
  • Ahmed Elbnoua
  • Mehdi Mnouer
  • Abdellah Malibo
  • Soufiane Aghmam

References
  1. Helfet, Gabriela (August 22, 2017). "Moroccan Gnawa maestro Maalem Mahmoud Gania's last album released on 2xLP for the first time". The Vinyl Factory. Retrieved November 16, 2022.
  2. Smith, C.F. (August 24, 2017). "Hive Mind Records set to release Maalem Mahmoud Gania 'Colours Of The Night' on vinyl for the first time". Twisted Soul. Retrieved November 16, 2022.
  3. "Colours of the Night by Maalem Mahmoud Gania". Bandcamp. Retrieved November 16, 2022.
  4. Rusu, Dragoș (October 25, 2017). "Maalem Mahmoud Gania - Colours of the Night". The Attic. Retrieved November 16, 2022.
  5. Murray, Harrison (March 9, 2020). "Album review: Maâlem Mahmoud Guinéa – Colours of the Night". The Vinyl Voice. Retrieved November 16, 2022.
  6. Bailey, Bradford (November 11, 2017). "on maalem mahmoud gania's colours of the night, the debut lp from hive mind records". The Hum. Retrieved November 16, 2022.
  7. Valvona, Dominic (September 1, 2017). "Our Daily Bread 257: Maalem Mahmoud Gania 'Colours Of The Night'". Monolith Cocktail. Retrieved November 16, 2022.
  8. "Listen to The Wire's Top 50 Releases of 2017". The Wire. December 2017. Retrieved November 16, 2022.
  9. "Wire: Top 50 Albums of 2017". Year-End Lists. December 5, 2017. Retrieved November 16, 2022.
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