Tuareg musical pioneers and Grammy Award-winning 'desert blues' band Tinariwen are returning to Australia.
More than 45 years into their storied career, Tinariwen return to the foundations of their sound on tenth album Hoggar, released earlier this year via their own label Wedge. The album embraces their early years of acoustic songwriting and communal singing around the desert campfire, and carrying songs of protest, love and hope in a musical tradition that has endured for generations despite repeated attempts to suppress it.
Fierce advocates for their people’s nomadic culture that exists in the desert borderlands between Mali and Algeria, Tinariwen’s bluesy, guitar-driven music has found global acclaim over the past two decades for its lively blend of Tamasheq-language politicism, syncopated rhythms and soaring melody.
Formed in 1979 in the Adrar des Ifoghas region of northern Mali, Tinariwen are pioneers of the assouf desert blues, and utilize their music to convey the struggles, exile and hopes of the Tuareg people - the nomadic people of the Sahara, many of whom came of age amid decades of rebellion and exile. Their sound blends blues, Saharan tradition and Arab influence into a musical identity that has left its mark on the international stage. The band rose to global prominence in the early 2000s with The Radio Tisdas Sessions, establishing themselves as the world's reference point for Tuareg blues.
Over the past 45 years Tinariwen have played more than 1,270 concerts and released ten albums, building a devoted audience across the globe. The band have been nominated for three Grammy Awards, winning in 2011 for Tassili, and have collaborated with artists including Kurt Vile, Yusuf Islam (Cat Stevens), Micah Nelson, Jack White, Flea and Warren Ellis.