Chabenda wrote
Personally I have always preferred his fellow musician, Thomas Mapfumo's music. Without being rude in any way to Thomas, I always found Oliver to be a much nicer person. His music is certainly more progressive but Thomas Mapfumo has done it for me. His various guitar players, over the years, have created some serious guitar work, capturing the essence of pulsating Shona mbira music.
I saw both of them in Harare in 1988. This was one stop on the Amnesty International "Human Rights Now!" tour. They had local guest acts at each show, and at Harare it was Thomas Mapfumo and Oliver Mutukudzi - each with their own band. Springsteen and Co opened up the show with "Get Up! Stand Up!" then handed the stage over. So we got a run of African acts to start, Mapfumo, Mutukudzi and then Yossou N'Dour and his fabulous band.
Kanda Bongoman is another African artist who is representative of a (IMHO) great style of guitar playing. I love the clean guitar tones.
There's a lot of great music in Africa, and some great GUITAR music. King Sunny Ade and his African Beats are a great band, and Tinariwen are one of the most electric bands around right now.
