Israel

Ethiopian artist Gili Yalo – joins forces with Grammy nominated music producers Niles City Sound – on new EP ‘Made In Amharica’

Check out this poignant and touching video that promotes Gili Yalo’s new Made In Amharica EP – a mix of Ethiopian desert psych meets Texan blues rock.

The screenplay of the video is built on a real history of Gili Yalo’s cousin, who got sick after moving to Israel from Ethiopia. The family decided that someone had put a spell on him and the only way to cure him was to go back to Ethiopia and find his shirt that was stolen.

The story reflects the thread of losing identity and being disconnected from your roots – and only by getting back to your culture, and exploring your own heritage, can you get back to your balance. The film is directed by Nadav Direktor, on location in Negev Desert, Israel.The Made in Ahmerica EP is available now digitally and will get a vinyl release in May. It compliments the announcement of Gili Yalo’s WOMAD 2019 performance this coming July. For the EP, the Ethiopian born and Israeli based musician collaborated with Niles City Sound – the Grammy nominated musicians and studio based in Fort Worth Texas, where the producers and musicians helped Leon Bridges hone his particular slant and sound.

Gili Yalo’s love of singing came about through hardship. As a five-year-old, he escaped the Ethiopian famine on foot as part of an exodus of Jewish people, often known as Operation Moses. Music made the journey more bearable. Eventually settling in Tel Aviv, Yalo surrounded himself with funk, soul and dub. On his debut album in 2017, all those sounds come together with a large helping of Ethiopian groove.

“The title is a word play,” Gili says. “Amharic is a language of Ethiopian people. I wrote this song in English and sent to a friend of mine in Ethiopia to have it translated. I wanted to create a song about the concept of living without borders. That is the thing that occupies my mind.”

The music is released through Dead Sea Recordings.

‘Naz’ is debut album of Iranian singer and film star Liraz and Israeli producer Rejoicer, fresh from his Stones Throw release

Liraz is influenced by Iran’s female musical icons of the 1970s – like Googoosh and Ramesh – and her debut album Naz is as fiery and defiant. She sings in Farsi, on an album dominated lyrically by the role of women in society and musically by the bounce of hip-hop and electronica. It is produced by Rejoicer (Yuvi Havkin), an Israeli beats, jazz and electronica artist who released an album on Stones Throw in August.

Liraz is driven by the diverse assemblage of stories which make up her heritage and her music has mobilised a campaign around women’s rights. Raised in Tel Aviv in Israel, her parents are from Iran yet political circumstances have meant that she’s never been able to visit, following the 1979 revolution. She is also a successful actor in both Israel and Hollywood, acting with the likes of Philip Seymour-Hoffman (A Late Quartet) and Naomi Watts (Fair Game).  It was in LA that Liraz heard music she could relate to and express herself through.

“Persians have these nice, polite manners of being like an Iranian woman,” she says. “You have to be good to your husband, good to your family, very polite… this is the only way I knew.” By way of illustrating her point, Liraz refers to the career of legendary pop singer Googoosh. It was in her music that she first saw a public image of a female Iranian swaggering with confidence, opening her eyes to this dusted-over lineage of public female figures in Iran. “But after the revolution, Googoosh was forced to stop singing, eventually leaving Iran so that she could keep singing outside her homeland,” Liraz says. “It’s a reflection of the newly-restricted role for female musicians in the revolution’s aftermath – and for female singers in particular, who are prohibited from performing solo for male audiences.”

The role of women in society is ever present in her lyrics. In Nozi Nozi she presents the idea of an Iranian archetype of a sweetly-smiling wife, subtly trying to wrestle what she wants out of her husband. Several of the tracks are covers of Iranian artists, like Hala Bavar, a version of one of Googoosh’s songs, pondering inner turmoil and how it relates to daily reality.

Collaborating with producer Rejoicer, also based in Tel Aviv, has created a fusion of Iran’s gamut of traditional instruments and a chemistry of hypnotic songs and heavy-weight beats.

Naz by Liraz is out now on Dead Sea Recordings.

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