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Fantazia - 21st century roots music from Algeria, via Hackney, East London, UK
Based in London, Fantazia are a multicultural eight-piece group composed of musicians from Algeria and the UK. Live, their potent grooves, with impassioned singing, soaring improvisations and the ever-present power of percussion, create a unique atmosphere, a celebratory force that soon has audiences on their feet and dancing. However, the music not only stands up to repeated listening, but rewards the listener with the depth of its invention and the emotional power of the atmospheres it evokes. In oud player and multi-instrumentalist Yazid Fentazi, Fantazia have a talented composer, whose tunes are distinguished by strong melodies, vibrant rhythms and dynamic arrangements.
With the worldwide release of their second CD Mul Sheshe, on Harmonia Mundi’s World Village label, Fantazia have taken a big step forward. Though deeply rooted in a variety of North African musical cultures, Mul Sheshe is also very much a product of the vibrant cultural mix of East London (part of the reason, were told, for London’s selection as site for the 2012 Olympics) where the band live and work. As The Daily Telegraph put it, "Yearning vocals lend a grittiness and authenticity to the dense, multi-layered music. Throbbing sufi trance grooves, wailing traditional oboes and buzzing percussion come up against meaty horns, big kit drums and Celtic fiddle." The songs on Mul Sheshe explore questions of identity in the modern world, in the aftermath of many years of turmoil in Algeria. There’s also, inevitably, concern with exile, migration and adaptation to living in Europe, functioning within and interacting with European culture. However, good spirits, dancing and having a good time are very much part of Algerian culture, and, as in the band’s live performances, they’re never far away on Mul Sheshe!
Fantazia emerged in the late ’90s from Hackney, East London (specifically, the members came together through the retrospectively famous international jam sessions at the Samuel Pepys, Mare Street). To the initial quartet, of oud, derbouka, bass and sax/flute, they soon added violin and drumkit, releasing their first CD in 2000, the all instrumental The Lost Place (on the bands own Mimouna label).
The Lost Place was critically acclaimed and received much radio airplay throughout Europe. Immigration problems (happily, now resolved) of certain key members prevented Fantazia from touring outside the UK to promote it, so its release was confined to Britain, as were the band, who, year on year, continued to gig steadily around the country. Live, finding audiences most responsive to the stronger rhythms, they increasingly placed more emphasis on these rhythmic qualities, and less on the lighter, more jazzy sound they had explored on The Lost Place. The whole band, but Yazid particularly, were additionally determined to broaden their appeal and communicate more deeply by performing songs.
For Fantazia’s 2003 UK tour, supported by The Arts Council of England, the band expanded further, adding keyboards, trumpet and a singer (to share lead vocals with Yazid) to the existing 6-piece. In their new 9-piece line-up, they started performing the songs that would eventually be recorded for Mul Sheshe. It took some time to put the new CD together and find a record company to release it, but after connecting with Harmonia Mundi UK in early 2005 things began to move more quickly. The band were much encouraged by Andy Kershaws early enthusiasm (pre-release airplay and a live session [in September] on his BBC Radio 3 show). Fantazia were featured in the September/October edition of Songlines, and in December they received the inaugural CEN Magazine (Creative Enterprise Network, East London) Award for Music. A track from Mul Sheshe (L’ahbab) was aired in October on fRoots Radio (at www.mondomix.com) before being included on the covermount CD of fRoots 271/272, billed as ’World class world music based right here in the UK’. At WOMEX 2005, just after the UK release, it was agreed that Mul Sheshe would be released internationally by Harmonia Mundi on World Village.
After a post-Khaled perfomance at Londons Barbican in early November 2005, they began touring extensively in the UK (England, Wales, Scotland) in support of Mul Sheshe (22 performances by May), a period of sustained work that enabled them to hit new heights musically and develop all aspects of their performance. The music is being welcomed as a unique blend of ancient and modern, deeply rooted in a variety of North African traditions but very much realised in the East London of today, where the band live and work.
In part because the Algerian community in London is relatively small (and less well-established than many other diaspora communities here), it is very outward-looking, and the members of Fantazia have worked in a wide variety of musical contexts with musicians from many cultural backgrounds, including, for instance, Joi, Oojami, Afro-Manding Drum Troupe and Jarmila Xymena Gorna, to name but four, as well as with other UK-based North African artists. Mul Sheshe is shaped by this spirit of cooperation and exchange, reflecting Londons unique cultural climate and demonstrating the emergence of the distinct musical identity of the UK-based Algerian community.
Yazid Fentazi, who, while still in Algeria, worked as a guitarist with Cheb Mami, Chaba Fadela and Cheb Sahraoui, the Turqui Brothers and Fateh Ben Lala, has toured recently in Europe with Natacha Atlas, Ali Slimani and U-Cef (as well as working with many British musicians, including Robert Plant and Marc Almond). Other band members currently perform with Mukka, Bellowhead and ZubopGambia and have performed in the past with outfits as diverse as Orchestra Jazira, Happy End, Menlo Park, The Waterboys, Stereo MCs, Gail Thompson’s Jazz Africa and Trevor Watts Moiré Music, and even with members of Kool and the Gang.
Fantazia’s music is deeply rooted in the diverse musical traditions of North Africa. In Algeria, Africa meets the Mediterranean. For centuries, exchange and interplay between African, oriental and European cultural streams has been constant. The traditions of Kabylia Berber music, rai, chaabi, chaoui, andalous and Gnawa have continued to develop and thrive, interacting in recent years with influences from the wider world. Both at home and among the diaspora in Europe, the music has continued to express the hopes, fears and aspirations of people deeply affected by the political and social upheavals of the last half century, and by the bittersweet experience of migration. Fantazia’s music unites all these strands, placing them firmly in the present.
Fantazia are a band with great commitment and spirit, with a strong belief that positive interaction between cultures can banish mistrust, work to prevent conflict and, of course, make for exciting music. Their ambition is to establish themselves as a distinctive voice on the international scene, playing music that speaks of Algeria, East London and the wider world. They have always been a multicultural band, and in the aftermath of the July 2005 bombings in London and other recent events, they want to be, both in the UK and abroad, a living example of the way in which, in the 21st century, the traditions of an Islamic country can enrich, interact positively with and find a place within British culture. The ups and downs of their experiences have made them all the more determined to succeed in their aims.
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