Sunday, May 8, 2016

Pleasures of the Hello Kitty Boom Box - Chaâbi Khadija


Well look what I found inside the Hello Kitty Boom Box - it's a cassette on the Anzaha imprint out of Rabat! I've shared one other Anzaha cassette here, and it was a good one!


I haven't been able to identify the singer featured on this tape. During the faux-live-audience opening banter at the beginning of track 5, I hear what sounds like the crowd chanting "Kha-di-ja, Kha-di-ja". She doesn't sound like Khadija al Bidaouia or Khadija Margoum. Sounds a bit like Khadija Laboat Al Atlas, but I haven't found any recordings of her that sound quite like this one. Please let me know if any of you can identify her.


Whoever this chaâbi-singing Khadija is, this is a jamming cassette in the Casa style with riffy viola, plinky banjo-keyboard, and driving varied percussion section throughout (some darbuka, some taârija, some bendir, and some live and/or programmed drum kit. I'd place it around the mid-aughts - the faux-live-audience, the keyboard sounds, and the absence of autotuned voices remind me of Daoudi cassettes from around '04.

Enjoy!

PS, yes, I have a Hello Kitty Boom Box.








Châabi cassette featuring singer Khadija (Anzaha cassette)
Track 5 (of 5) 

Get it all here.

5 comments:

  1. Nothing goes better together than Hello Kitty and Morocco.

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  2. Lovely Hello Kitty boombox. :)

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  3. ¿ could it be cheba khadija rbatia ?

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    Replies
    1. Sounds like a different style to me. It's a mystery!

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  4. yes hello kitty takes every cassette to the next level
    thanks for the continuing treasure.
    robert

    ReplyDelete